


Take on Me

by haztobegood



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Actor Harry, Explicit Sexual Content, Famous Harry, Light Dom/sub, M/M, Magical Realism, Recreational Drug Use, Soulmates, Stunt Coordinator Louis, Used-to-be Famous Louis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-18
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-09-25 22:41:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 60,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20379310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haztobegood/pseuds/haztobegood
Summary: Actor Harry Styles is preparing for his next leading role as Antonius the Gladiator with the help of Louis Tomlinson, Hollywood’s top stunt coordinator. When the demands of Harry’s career get in the way of their training, the pair head to a secluded cabin to complete their training. Then, Louis begins to share senses with Harry. What is causing this mysterious connection and can Louis and Harry figure out how to stop it before they leave the cabin?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jacaranda_bloom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacaranda_bloom/gifts).

> This fic was written for the [1D Ridiculous Fic Exchange](http://1dridicficexchange.tumblr.com/). I got this amazing prompt from Dee and had so much fun writing this story that it ended up being about 20k longer than planned! 
> 
> Thank you to [Molly](http://hlplease.tumblr.com/) for being a wonderful beta and helping me to improve this story. 
> 
> Thank you to [Rebecca](https://archiveofourown.org/users/runaway_train) and [Dee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jacaranda_bloom/) for organizing such a creative and brilliant exchange!

The elevator dings and the doors slide open. Harry rushes onto the twelfth floor and runs down the hall to the conference room. His phone has been pinging constantly for the past ten minutes, but he doesn’t control the Friday rush hour traffic. He’s late again, and he doesn’t want to stress out his agent, Liam. He hates that he’s known for being late and seen as high maintenance because of it. It it’s not his fault that his management tries to squeeze in more working hours than humanly possible. It’s a blessing Liam has known him for as long as he has and knows his tardiness is not from his own choosing. 

He bursts through the door and finds that Liam and his management's lawyer, Rebecca, are sat at the large wooden table directly across the door. “Sorry, sorry. Traffic is terrible.” Harry mumbles to the room. Harry only offers the briefest of glimpses as he rushes around and throws his bag onto a chair and takes the seat next to Liam. Liam sags in his seat, sighing in relief at his arrival. Rebecca impatiently taps her capped pen against the table. There is another man in the room, sitting with his back to the door. His chair swivels around at the commotion of Harry’s entrance. 

Harry adjusts his seat, puts his phone on “Do Not Disturb” and tucks it into his bag. Then, he looks up at the guest he is meant to be meeting. The man is around Harry’s age, with an angular face, soft layered fringe, and slim but strong frame, at least from what he can see. His eyes are an intense blue, bright even under the harsh fluorescent lighting of the conference room. He’s wearing a grey and white bomber jacket with green accents over a white t-shirt underneath, leaning heavily on the casual part of business casual. He holds himself with an air of confidence that demands attention. Harry is intrigued.

“Alright. Let’s get started.” Liam says. “Harry, as you’re aware, the _Redemption in Rome_ production team has hired a trainer to help you prepare for your next role. This is Louis Tomlinson. He’ll be the stunt coordinator for the movie, and will also be training you. Mr. Tomlinson, this is Harry Styles.”

“Nice to meet you Mr. Tomlinson,” Harry reaches out to shake his hand across the table. He has heard that name before, but he can’t recall where. Maybe he is credited on other movies. He’ll have to ask Liam after the meeting.

“Please, call me Louis.” Louis says while returning the handshake firmly. He has a soft smile and a light voice. Harry catches the northern British accent, it’s been a while since he’s met any other Brits in LA.

“Alright, now that introductions are out of the way, let’s talk contracts.” Liam opens his leather padfolio, always so professional. 

Louis’ proposed plans are rigorous, with twelve hour days devoted to training, strengthening, and toning to prepare Harry for his role as the gladiator Anotonius. Training is set from 6:30 am to 7:00 pm with a half hour for lunch. The tight schedule is due to having only four weeks, when Louis usually spreads out such intense training over 3 months. It’s all very intimidating and he doesn’t see how it’s going to be possible with his already crammed schedule. But, Harry wants to be as prepared as possible before he gets in front of the camera. So he agrees. 

More than an hour of dry contract negotiation later, Harry feels wrung out. Liam closes his padfolio and wraps up the meeting. “Thanks for coming in today, Louis,” he says.

“It was my pleasure, Liam. Harry, it was great to meet you. I look forward to beginning our training on Monday.” Louis offers a bright smile and a wave of his hand as he heads for the door. 

“Yeah, see you then.” Harry feigns a smile, then slumps in his chair as soon as the door latches shut. 

“Liam,” Harry sulks. “How am I meant to follow his schedule? You know I already don’t have time to spare.”

“I will have your back on this, if it gets to be too much, just let me know.” Liam shuffles through a stack of paper in his padfolio, pulling out one sheet and skimming it before he continues. “Also, the production company did make this a requirement of your contract and that supersedes any contracted appearances by your PR team or management for the duration of the film’s production, right Rebecca?”

The lawyer at the end of the table perks up at the mention of her name. Harry had forgotten she was in the room after she’d blended back into the wall as soon as the contracts were signed. “That’s exactly right. Your other duties cannot interfere with those of the production company, since the movie is on a tight budget and timeline. It’s a standard clause.” 

“Alright, well that’s slightly comforting.” Harry says.

“Hopefully the next month won’t be too promo heavy.” Liam reassures. “It’ll be a few months before the trailer drops so they should be able to lighten your schedule.”

They wrap a few more loose ends and then Liam dismisses Harry and Rebecca.

“Well, that’s it for tonight,” Liam says. “I’ve got to get copies of the signed contract filed away before I can leave, but there’s no sense for you to hang around the office on a Friday night.” Rebecca says a quick goodbye to the two men and exits the office. 

“You have a good night, too. And don’t stay too late.” Harry grabs his bag and heads for the door. 

“I won’t. And H, I am serious. If the training is too much, just let me know and we can sort it out.” 

“Yes, boss. I’ll let you know.” Harry says, sending a mock salute his way. Liam always was a worrier, but that’s one of the reasons he’s such a great agent and friend. 

“Good luck with training on Monday!” 

Harry pushes through the massive glass door at the front of the office and walks down the street. He’d parked in a ramp down the block, as the valet had been closed when he’d arrived to the office. The golden sun shines off the mirrored windows of the skyscrapers lining the block. It must be later than Harry anticipated. He pulls out his phone and discovers that it is already after seven. 

It gets darker and darker as the last remnants of sunlight dip under the horizon. Despite the cloudless sky, there’s no sign of the moon tonight and the last fifteen minutes of his drive are very dark. He’s careful on the winding roads, cautious of every curve in such low light. He is relieved to finally pull into his garage for the night. 

After he crawls into bed, Harry lies awake for a long time. He stares at the dark ceiling with a million anxieties plaguing him. He worries how much work it will be for Liam to rearrange all of his pre-existing appointments. He worries about the strict schedule Louis proposed. And he has no clue how he will manage to stay sane through the next month.

Despite Liam and Rebecca’s assurances, Harry knows there is very little chance that they will grant him an entire month without interruption. Ever since his first major role three years ago, his PR team has packed his schedule with promotional events, staged fan sightings, and organized pap outings. His life has become an endless stream of commitments, with his management pulling every which way to make sure he stays present in the general public’s radar. It’s doubtful that his new training schedule will get his team to relent on overbooking his time. But he can hope. 

Harry finally falls into a fitful sleep. He tosses and turns as he dreams of a quiet pond filled with bright blue water, glowing under the moonlight.


	2. Chapter 2

Louis is excited to begin training with Harry. It’s been a few months since he has had a project lined up, and he is thrilled to be working on _Redemption in Rome_. Louis jumped at the chance when the production company had approached him to be the stunt coordinator for a movie about gladiators. While he hasn’t studied this style of fighting before, he does love a good challenge. He’d spent the last month studying books and videos created by Roman historians to learn how gladiators fought and working out the scenes from the script.

And when the production company had mentioned needing a trainer for the lead actor, Louis had suggested training Harry himself to streamline the process. He was already finished planning the fight scenes and he is ready to put his new skills to work. 

He is also looking forward to working with Harry. He has seen some of his other films, and knows the man is a brilliant actor. And he is fit, so the foundation he is working with is promising. He’s ready to go bright and early Monday morning, bounding up to the front door at exactly 6:30 am with a bag of training materials slung over his shoulder. 

After several knocks, Louis waits to be let in. Harry is slow to answer the door. The deadbolt clinks and the door swings open slowly. 

“Good morning.” Harry says slowly, his voice still rough with sleep. He steps aside and waves Louis in. 

“Good morning. I’m just finishing up breakfast in the kitchen. If you’ll follow me.” Harry takes off without another word. Louis follows into the kitchen, where Harry is taking the last few bites of some fruit and oatmeal. “Would you like some tea or water?” 

“No I’m good, thanks.” Louis sets his bag on the floor and pulls out a green paper folder. “While you’re finishing up, mind if I start?” Louis is eager to start, always ready to go in the mornings. He’s always preferred to get going early in the morning for training, hitting the gym early during his MMA days, and maintains that schedule even now that he isn’t the one in training. 

“No, go ahead.” He can tell Harry isn’t quite a morning person. He looks like he’s just rolled out of bed. He’s in a large, soft shirt that is old enough that holes have worn through in a few spots, and loose red basketball shorts low on his waist. His hair is an unruly mess, curls in every direction. 

“As you remember from our meeting on Friday, we have much less time than I like to have for training for such a physical role.” He hands Harry the folder and opens it to the first packet of papers. “Because of this, our training will be very intense. It is very important that with such an intense training schedule, you are consuming enough healthy calories each day, drinking lots of water, and getting plenty of rest. Just general health things, but they become super important so that you don’t burn out or injure yourself.” Louis emphasizes.

“Okay.” Harry nods along, skimming over a few of the papers as Louis continues.

“I’ve created a daily schedule and diet plan for you to follow. I expect you to stick as close to this as possible.” Louis says firmly. The plan is intense, and can be very intimidating. Louis hopes it won’t be a problem.

Harry flips through the documents, then nods. “Thanks, I’ll try my best.”

“Great! Then, on to what we’ll actually be training. I’ve done a lot of research about gladiators, their fighting styles, and also read through the script and worked with the director to get a grasp on what they’re looking for. For your role, it will require a lot of sword fighting and hand-to-hand combat. I’m guessing you’ve not had a lot of experience with a sword?”

“Um, no. Not like this.” 

“That’s what we will spend a majority of our time on then. I don’t want to just teach you a couple of moves and give you set choreography. I know that’s not typical for some stunt coordinators. I prefer to teach the actual methods and techniques to make the actors’ movements as natural as possible. This means more work on both our parts, but the result is much better on-screen. It’ll allow you to improvise and feel confident in every scene. What d’ya think?”

“Sounds good to me.” Harry takes the last drink of his tea, and then sets the dishes in the sink. “If you want, I can give you a quick tour of the house, since you’ll be here so often. And then we can head to the gym.” 

Louis agrees. soHarry leads them around the house. Harry rambles nervously, telling short anecdotes and making a few minorly self deprecating jokes as they make their way from the kitchen. He points out a living room, dining room, outdoor patio, and then turning down a hallway. Each room is distinctly decorated and contains a variety of unique knick knacks that clutter shelves and side tables. It’s quirky, but cozy and personal. It’s the furthest thing from the minimalist, masculine interior Louis was anticipating based on Harry’s public persona as Hollywood’s resident heartthrob and most-eligible bachelor. 

Harry stops at the third bedroom on the left, “This is a guest room, you’re welcome to use it during our training time here. There’s an en suite bathroom through that door. I noticed there was some rest time on our daily schedules occasionally, so you’re welcome to use it, or any of the common spaces in the house too.” 

Next, he leads them down a staircase and it opens into a large lounge, complete with a movie theater sized screen and a sectional couch. They pass an assortment of arcade games and a ping pong table, then head down a hallway to another set of doors. “So this is the gym.” Harry says, then opens the last door slowly, revealing it to Louis. 

The gym is fully stocked with all the standard gym equipment, free weights, treadmill, bench press, rowing machine and more, all arranged along mirrored walls. The far right corner of the gym is set up for boxing. There’s a punching bag and speed bag hanging from the ceiling, and an overflowing box of gloves, tape, and other accessories sitting on the bench behind it. To the right, there’s another doorway.

“If you need something for training and I don’t have it, just let me know and we can work it out.”

“I highly doubt there’s anything you don’t have. This is amazing.” Louis says as he spins in a slow circle, taking in the room. He is a little jealous of Harry’s in-home gym. It’s nicer than ninety percent of the gyms he’s trained in.

“And there’s one last room.”

“There’s more!?” Louis exclaims, his eye widening.

Harry has a meek smile, almost as if he’s shy to show off his extensive gym. He returns to the hallway and opens another door. Inside is a full studio. “Um, you’ll have to take off your shoes when we use this room. There’s a bench to our left where you can change shoes or store your things.” 

They stand at the doorway and Louis takes it all in. The shiny pine hardwood stretches across the full-sized studio. The bench Harry mentioned is built into the wall next to the doorway, with shelves and cupboards also built in for storage. The back wall is mirrored with a barre halfway up. The lighting is soft and warm and the whole room is very professional looking. But what steals Louis’ breath away is the wall to his left. The entire wall is floor-to-ceiling windows. The view overlooks a spacious backyard with lots of green plants and colorful blooming flowers. The early morning sun filtering through the windows cast a bright glow over the whole room. It’s peaceful and Louis can imagine lots of yoga sessions.

“I might have to reorganize your schedule a bit to include more sunrise yoga.” Louis says.

“This is my favorite room in the house. Built this room specifically for that and it faces south so I can do sunrise or sunset yoga, cause I’m flexible like that.” Harry barks out a laugh.

“Oh my god, are your jokes always that bad, Styles?” Louis chuckles.

“Bad, conversational puns are the highest form of comedy. Anyway, now that you’ve seen everything, where would you like to start?”

“Let’s head back into the gym. I’m gonna spend the first few hours assessing your current fitness and then we’ll go from there.” Louis is glad that it seems Harry and he will get along well, and that he is warming up to him. Now that they’re in the gym, Harry seems less nervous.

Louis is wrapping up his first round of tests, basic assessments like run one mile, flexibility and stability measurements, and push-ups. So far, he is very impressed with Harry’s starting stats. He’s already met the benchmarks for strength, flexibility, and endurance that Louis planned. That will give them much more time to focus on the technical training. They’re off to a great start and the month of training should go pretty smoothly. Louis explains as much to Harry.

Of course, that is when trouble comes knocking. Or rather, buzzing. 

As Harry completes his final rep of pull ups, his phone buzzed, signalling the arrival of a new text message. Louis can see that Harry’s focus wavers with the sound. Another text comes in and Harry drops from the bar, landing a bit harder than he probably intended. He keeps glancing nervously at the bench he’d left his phone on, but he doesn’t go look. 

“Do you need to take that?” Louis asks. 

“Nah, it’s just management, probably trying to arrange some interviews or something. Liam will handle it.”

“Alright, are you ready to move on to weights?”

The intermittent buzzing of texts continues as Harry does deadlifts. As Louis is spotting his bench presses, the buzzing changes, constantly buzzing to signal an incoming call. Harry groans and almost drops the bar. “Woah, steady.” Louis helps him replace the bar. “I think that’s good enough for now. Let’s take an hour for lunch.” 

Louis heads to the kitchen to prepare their lunches while Harry goes upstairs to return the missed phone calls. He returns fifteen minutes later, much quieter than before. Louis attempts to make some light conversation but can hear the reluctance in Harry’s one-word replies, so he lets it drop. 

They return to training for the afternoon. This time they enter the big studio, bright with the full power of the LA afternoon sun. Louis is excited to begin demonstrating sword techniques. 

Harry does not share his enthusiasm. It’s clear that he is still distracted as he is struggling to remember even the most basic footwork. Not even an hour after they begin, Harry’s phone starts ringing again.

“Maybe you should turn it off for our lessons.” Louis suggests in a controlled tone. He clenches his jaw tight to prevent any further comments. While he doesn’t allow phones in his own gym, he’d made an exception because they were at Harry’s house. He is starting to regret that decision.

“My team doesn’t allow me to avoid their messages for too long. They’re not patient when they need something.” Harry’s shoulders drop as his phone buzzes with yet another text message.

“I don’t want to overstep with your team or anything, but I could talk with someone if it’s an issue. Just say the word and I’ll tell them off. It is part of my contract that my trainees are not distracted by other business during sessions.”

“No, no, you don’t need to do that. I’ll just ask Liam to take care of it. Let me message him and then I’ll turn off my phone.” Harry jogs over to the bench and picks up his phone. He unlocks it, types a quick message, and powers it off before dropping it back onto the bench. 

“Sorry.” Harry looks sheepish as he returns to the spot in front of Louis. The rest of the afternoon, Louis can tell something is weighing on Harry’s mind. He’s not very quick on the uptake of the new techniques and he seems to space out frequently between moves. 

Louis calls it a day at 6:45 pm. Usually he’s not one to wrap up early, but he can see the exhaustion from an intense first day of training and knows that the emotional stresses don’t help Harry’s situation any. Louis is also tired, as it’s been months since his last full-time training sessions. But he’s had years of practice where his physical condition was scrutinized so closely that he is able to easily mask the signs of exhaustion. Harry doesn’t have that practice and his physical exhaustion clearly shows in every movement. 

Louis leaves him with wishes of a good night’s sleep and reminds him he’ll be back bright and early for tomorrow’s session.

\- - -

Louis shows up at exactly 6:30 am again. He rings the doorbell three times before he finally hears the lock turning.

“Good morning, Louis-” Harry stifles a yawn as he invites him inside. He very clearly just rolled out of bed, as there are faint pink indents along his right cheek from where he’d been lying. Louis tries not to let this slip up affect his mood, but it’s clear that Harry is not adhering to his suggested sleep schedule. Maybe it is because it was the first night and adjusting to a new sleep schedule can be hard. He gives Harry the benefit of the doubt.

But it is obvious as they start their training that Harry is exhausted. It is clearly more than forgetting to set an alarm. It is like he is moving through molasses with every step Louis shows him. And it absolutely doesn’t help that Harry’s phone begins going off again around 9 am. Harry flinches with every text message that comes in. 

“Sorry.” Harry heads over to check his phone and return some of the messages. Louis watches his mirrored reflection cross the studio. His shoulders are hunched in more than usual and he has dark circles under his eyes. He looks so tired and defeated. Louis decides on the spot to switch up his agenda for the day, changing tactics to work on flexibility and meditation until lunch to hopefully clear Harry’s mind and relax him enough so that he can focus on the sword fighting training after lunch.

They’re lying on yoga mats, doing some cool down stretches when Louis decides to ask what’s really going on. He’s not a therapist, but it’s clear there is something on Harry’s mind that is blocking him from focusing. 

“So… Do you want to talk about your team?”

“Um, well. Liam just texted to remind me of an appointment tomorrow. It’s nothing.” Harry shrugs it off and leans deeper into the stretch.

“Liam seemed nice when I’ve talked to him. He doesn’t seem like the type to constantly badger your phone.”

“It’s not just Liam.” Harry switches to stretch his other side, effectively turning his back to Louis. 

“But the others must know that you’re training for your role, yeah?” Louis asks cautiously, sensing Harry is trying to shut down the conversation. 

It’s silent for a few cycles of breath, and Louis thinks Harry is not going to answer, before Harry finally blows out a loud breath and says, “My team called last night. They were really angry when I didn’t answer yesterday. Especially after I turned off the phone and calls went straight to voicemail. They laid into me about being irresponsible and disrespecting their time.” Harry shifts into another stretch. “So I’m going to have to check my phone more often, and I cannot turn it off.”

Louis cannot believe Harry’s team is so angry about that. He wonders what could have been so urgent as to require an immediate response. “Oh, Harry, I’m sorry that you got in trouble for that yesterday. What was so important that they needed you to respond to?” Louis continues stretching beside Harry, waiting for an answer.

“Nothing important.” Harry says coolly. Then he jumps up, rolls up his yoga mat and leaves the studio. Louis is stunned at the sudden exit. Their session was almost over anyway but the abrupt way Harry left, without even saying goodbye, is startling. Louis’ questions must have pushed a wrong button.

\- - -

The third day of practice starts out better than the second had ended. Harry is more focused and there seem to be less calls than the previous two days. With minimal distractions, they are able to cover a lot and even have a bit of fun. Louis is really enjoying his time training Harry. He’s not all Hollywood drama and diva attitude. Louis is starting to uncover the more interesting facets of Harry’s personality behind all the stress and fatigue.

They’d spent the morning on endurance and strength training. Light banter and jokes filled the spaces between each activity Louis made Harry do, but after hours in the gym the side effects of the intense workout are becoming visible. Louis can see it in the way Harry is reluctantly squatting during each rep and losing his form due to fatigue. 

“Come on Harry, one more rep!” Louis encourages. “Then we can break for lunch.”

“Gahhh.” Harry growls as he deadlifts the bar one last time. He raises the weight up, and then drops it to the floor. 

“Alright! Great work, H!” Louis slaps him on the back, the new nickname slipping out unfiltered. But Harry doesn’t seem to mind, just grunting at the praise as he wipes the sweat from his face with a towel.

After they exit the gym, Harry goes upstairs to return phone calls while Louis cooks lunch. He’s got two slices of salmon in the oven, and some broccoli on the stove. So Louis sits alone at the breakfast bar and scrolls through Twitter as he waits for the timer to countdown. A retweeted tabloid heading on his Twitter feed catches his attention. It's of Harry and a woman leaving a club late at night. Both look worse for wear and incredibly drunk as they climb into a black vehicle. It’s dated last night. Louis is a bit upset that Harry is not sticking to Louis’ regimen and sleep schedule, and a lot upset that he trying to hide this from Louis. He’d noticed that Harry had been off today, but guessed it was just from the stresses they’d discussed the day before. But clearly not, if he was hungover and lacking sleep. He shouldn’t be training all day and partying all night. He’d burn himself out.

Harry comes bounding down the stairs, “Lunch smells good!”

“Thanks.” Louis replies. He’s still grappling with the discovery of Harry’s late night escapade and debating how he should bring it up. In the end he decides to just go for it, figuring that if Harry doesn’t like his schedules and plans, then he should know. 

“Um, Harry. I saw an article. It says that you went out last night. To a club.”

“Oh, you saw that.” Harry shrinks in on himself, shoulders hunched and looking down at his hands. He nervously twists at his ring. “I know you have your schedules and I tried to stick with them-”

“You clearly haven’t,” Louis interrupts, crossing his arms and staring him down as he prepares for a confrontation. “It’s been nearly three days and you haven’t stuck to the plan at all, Harry.” 

“Harry looks up, meeting Louis’ stare. “I can explain.”

“Please do.” Louis says. The oven timer goes off. Harry grabs an oven mitt and busies himself with plating their lunch. Louis waits in the silence of the kitchen, giving Harry time to begin his explanation.

With two plates of salmon and asparagus set in front of them, Harry begins to talk, his voice quiet and slow, as if each word is carefully metered.

“It was a pap outing. The team is trying to build public interest for _Redemption in Rome_. She will be playing Carinia, Antonius’ love interest. We’re managed by the same team, so sending us out for a late night of clubbing is an easy, low effort way for them to get people talking.”

“Oh.” Louis says, letting Harry’s confession settle in his mind. He was geared up for a confrontation. He had assumed that Harry was being defiant and just wanted to party, that he didn’t have any regard for the work Louis was doing. But it’s hard to stay angry when Harry looks miserable as he explains. 

“Why didn’t you tell them you couldn’t go?” Louis asks.

“I’ve always been required to do those for certain articles. It’s unavoidable.” Harry looks so defeated in the moment, that Louis doesn’t have the heart to dig any further. He decides to steer the conversation away, but before he can change the topic, Harry releases a pent up sigh. “It’s just frustrating that everything is built on false pretenses. It feels wrong to create elaborate lies in order to sell my movie. Shouldn’t my fans be interested in my movie for the story? Or for my acting? Why do they only care about who I date? Sometimes I wonder if anything in Hollywood is right. Or real.”

The silence is heavy with the emotion Harry has laid out. Louis tries to soothe it over. “From what I’ve seen of being famous, not everything is black and white, right or wrong. I’m sure your true fans can see what’s real and what’s fake.”

“Maybe.” 

The weighted silence once again fills the kitchen, and this time Louis successfully turns the conversation away from the heavier topics. “So, do you have plans to watch the game on Saturday?” Saturdays are their one scheduled day off, a much needed day of rest with their grueling training. And Louis is fully intending to use his day of rest to watch his favorite team play. 

They make idle chit chat, small talk about Saturday’s game and the teams and players they like. By the time Harry is stacking the dirty dishes in the dishwasher, the mood has completely turned. Their earlier conversation is nearly forgotten. But Louis doesn’t forget the sadness he’d seen radiating from Harry as he’d discussed how he was required to be seen with his costar. In fact, the sadness haunts him through the rest of the afternoon session. It stews in the back of his mind, as Louis wonders if there’s a bit more to Harry’s misery than just a few outings with an actress.

\- - -

Louis leads the way, down the hall to the studio with his gym bag slung over his shoulder. He’s eager to begin today’s lesson. The mood has been light all morning as Harry and Louis bantered easily back and forth while they drank their tea. There’s no trace of yesterday’s heavy atmosphere.

Louis drops his gym bag on the bench in the studio and unzips it. He pulls out two swords and turns toward Harry. The swords are clearly fake, made of hard grey plastic, double-edged, but blunt on the edges. They’re replicas of the traditional gladius swords. He’d had a friend from a props department whip up when he’d first signed on as the stunt coordinator for the gladiator movie. 

“Think you’re ready to handle this, Styles?” Louis pokes Harry playfully in the chest with one of the swords. 

“Probably, since I have such a great trainer” Harry winks. His phone buzzes on the bench. They both ignore it. 

“I am a pretty great teacher. And I’m an excellent swordsman.” 

“Are you now? Have a lot of experience wielding swords, do you?” Harry quips. 

Louis feels warmth flood his cheeks as he realizes the turn this conversation has taken. As he thinks of a comeback the phone buzzes again. Harry flinches, nearly imperceptibly. If Louis hadn’t been watching for it, he wouldn’t have seen the way Harry blinked just slightly harder, the tension creasing his eyebrows for a brief second.

Two more texts come in right after. Harry continues to ignore it. Louis knows it’s a point of contention and doesn’t want to nag about his phone, so he lets it be. 

In the moment of distraction, Harry pulls the sword away from Louis, grips the hilt and jumps into an exaggerated lunge. “Alright, let’s see what you’ve got, Oh Great Swordmaster!” Then he bursts out in a loud laugh that fills the studio with a warm happy energy.

Louis raises the spare sword in his left hand, tosses it to his dominant hand, and takes his practiced stance. “Arrrgh!” Louis growls as he surges forward and they begin to play-fight. 

Louis counters each of Harry’s moves, using his actual skill to out maneuver Harry’s clumsy movements. Louis carefully notes the strengths and weaknesses of Harry’s tendencies as they dance around the room in uncoordinated battle. Harry naturally utilizes his long arms and legs to his advantage while yielding the short gladius, but his movements aren’t graceful. He trips over his feet as he dodges Louis’ attacks and awkwardly thrusts his sword without proper adjustments that would make for effective blows. But he has good reflexes, moving quickly when required. It is the perfect foundation to work with. 

Louis can see some of the training from earlier in the week had gotten through to Harry as he naturally returns to some of the stances they’d practiced, but they still have a long way to go. Louis darts forward, aiming his sword for Harry’s shoulder, who is quick to defend. However, the defensive move exposes his left side, and Louis seizes the opportunity. He uses that weakness, lunging forward using all his momentum to topple both of them to the ground. He straddles Harry, who looks up in utter shock at being overtaken unexpectedly. Louis places his plastic gladius right up to Harry’s throat and looks him in the eye. 

“I’ve got you now.” Louis smirks.

Then the phone begins to vibrate, a call breaking through their pretended sword fight, and Louis realizes his position. He jumps up suddenly, not wanting to make the situation awkward. He takes a step back, then offers a hand to help Harry off the floor. The phone stops buzzing as he pulls Harry to his feet.

“So, are you ready to learn how to actually fight, instead of just waving that around?”

“Hey! I had you for a bit there.” Harry gripes, his lip turning out in an exaggerated pout.

“Sure you did.” Louis chuckles.

The phone rings again. Harry sighs. “Let’s keep going. How do I stand?” Harry jumps back into the exaggerated lunge that he seems to think is appropriate. 

“Remember all the stuff we’ve been working on the past few days? Let’s start there. Do you know the first stance we learned?”

Harry adjusts his stance into something close to what they’d been practicing. Then the phone rings again.

Their morning session continues this way for a bit. Louis guiding Harry into positions, showing him ways to move the sword naturally and with the right force. And then they’re interrupted by the phone. Unrelenting buzzing of unread texts and missed calls permeates the studio. 

At first,Louis thinks nothing of it. But as the unread notifications pile up, Harry continues to deflect the buzzing with questions and banter. He must be avoiding whatever his team thinks is so urgent. But for once, Harry is actually trying to focus and fully invested in the process. Louis wonders if it is the aid of the prop swords that made it more interesting for Harry to focus, or if it is just a means of blocking out the problems waiting for him in his phone.

Louis makes small adjustments to Harry’s posture, raising his elbow and turning his wrist to get the sword in the correct position. There’s so much tension held in his shoulders. The phone buzzes again and he flinches. Harry is probably thinking that Louis doesn’t notice how much it’s affecting him, but he does.

Finally, after the eighth missed call, Louis puts his foot down. “Harry, you’ve got to turn off your phone. We can straighten it out with your team, but this clearly isn’t helping you. We’re on too tight a schedule for your team to distract us. Let’s take fifteen so you can go deal with whatever that is and then we’ll get back to the swordfighting.”

“‘Kay.” Harry mutters tersely. He sulks off down the hall with his phone in hand.

Harry returns from the short break looking like he’d just met Death. All of the previous bright, playful energy from their earlier play-fight was smothered by whatever he’d found waiting for him on the other end of the phone. 

Louis sets down his water bottle and approaches him slowly, as if he is an easily startled fawn. “H, want to talk about it?”

“Not really.” Harry sits at the bench, staring out the window. There’s anger and hurt behind his idle stare. Sword fighting wouldn’t be much use right now, and Harry isn’t in a state to learn something new, so Louis switches up their schedule… Again. 

He isn’t usually so lenient with his trainees. He can’t remember a time when he had deviated from any of his carefully crafted regimens because of a client’s emotional state. But here he is, just four days into his contract with Harry, and he has already made so many exceptions. Maybe Louis is just going soft, too long away from the intensity of his training back in the day. Maybe it is that he sees some of his past self within Harry, with the struggles of a management team that only sees him as an image that can be sold. Or just maybe, he actually cares about Harry and doesn’t want to see him hurting. That last possibility is the most frightening to Louis. 

Louis suggests a round of boxing, knowing Harry needs to get some release from the stress. If he isn’t willing to talk about it, maybe he would be willing to work it out physically. And Louis argues with himself mentally that he had planned for some strength and endurance training for the afternoon, so they could just switch it around. Changing the timing of the sessions doesn’t really count as changing the schedule. Yeah, Harry isn’t getting special treatment.

Harry agrees quietly, following Louis into the gym with his head hanging low. He silently and methodically tapes his wrists with practiced motions. Harry says he just wants to use the punching bag, so Louis takes a seat on the bench behind him, and tries not to watch Harry too closely as he warms up. 

His warm up is short and he quickly transitions into an aggressive assault on the bag. Harry throws his punches harder, grunting with each blow to the bag. Harry attacks his workout with a ferocity that Louis has yet to see during their other training sessions. Louis’ eyes trace the contours of Harry’s muscles. He catches himself, looking away quickly. He shouldn’t be gawking at his trainee and does not want to make Harry uncomfortable. He watches the clock on the wall instead. With nothing else to distract him, he follows the second hand in a circle counting the minutes.

He can hear the change in Harry’s breathing, as the exhaustion takes over his lungs. His muscles are straining and the sweat has soaked through his shirt. His punches have slowed but still make a loud impact with the bag. His hands must be sore. Harry throws another hook but miscalculates where the bag would swing. His fist misses the intended target, swiping the edge of the bag. It throws Harry off balance and he trips forward, catching himself at the last second to remain upright. He growls in frustration and slams both fists onto the bag and then sinks down onto the floor and sprawls out, star fishing onto the cool gym floor. 

Louis is unsure how to react, or if he should even try. Every other time he has brought up Harry’s frustrations, he has put up more walls and shut Louis out. So, Louis stays silent and waits for Harry to make a move. 

Three minutes pass, filled with Harry’s labored breathing and the ticking of the clock. 

“I posted a picture on Instagram.” Harry says quietly.

At first Louis, doesn’t know what to make of the statement. He stays silent. Only forty seconds go by before Harry continues. It takes him a while to share his thoughts with Louis, each slow statement punctuated by moments of silence.

“I posted it last night. My team thinks the post was inappropriate. So they’re angry with me.” 

Louis stays silent, waiting for more. Instead Harry peels himself off the floor. “Let’s have lunch.” He says over his shoulder as he exits the gym.

\- - -

Louis is back at his own apartment before curiosity gets the better of him. He opens the app and searches for Harry’s account. He’s apprehensive about checking Harry’s Instagram. He’s especially worried that whatever Harry posted may be inappropriate, that it might affect the way he sees Harry. He doesn’t want to overstep their professional relationship. But he can’t not look either. It’s been nagging at the back of his mind all afternoon. He’d gone through what-ifs and worst case scenarios of all the types of posts that a PR team might find inappropriate for an actor.

What he finds is the furthest thing from any of the lewd posts he’d thought up over the past few hours. 

There, in the square photo, is the pair of Harry’s socked feet. One foot is in a white sock, one in a black sock. The caption reads “I saw you kicking dirt in my eye.” It’s a bizarre post, but there’s something familiar about that phrase that Louis can’t place. He knows he’s heard it before, but can’t connect the dots. It just doesn’t make sense, why would his team be upset about this post? He scrolls through the top comments seeing if one of them might offer some clues. Immediately, one catches his eye. “I love mj” That’s it! It’s a Michael Jackson lyric. 

Louis racks his brain for the song title, quickly realizing it’s from “Black or White”. He opens Spotify and plays the song, listening to the lyrics. “_I am tired of this devil/I am tired of this stuff/I am tired of this business_” Louis flashes back to the previous afternoon, their brief discussion in the kitchen about Harry’s required paparazzi outings and how Louis had told him that not everything was black and white when you are famous. Was Harry posting about “Black or White” because of what Louis had said? Had Louis’ words of consolation caused Harry to get in trouble? Is there anything he could do to help Harry get away from it all?

It takes a long time for Louis to fall asleep that night. His mind is too busy thinking of answers to his questions for sleep to come. He’s not sure what to do, but one thing is obvious. He has to get Harry away from his insufferable team.


	3. Chapter 3

Harry is pulling a shirt over his head when his phone buzzes. It startles him. Usually the texts don’t come until later in the morning, as his team runs on normal business hours, not his crazy training schedule. He ties back his nearly-shoulder-length hair with a bandana before he steels himself to look at the waiting message. He picks up the phone and sees that it is a text from Louis. 

**From Louis (06:13 am):** Morning H. Something came up. Won’t get in til 11. I’ve emailed you some research. Watch videos first pls

Harry responds immediately with a thumbs up emoji then locks his phone and tosses it onto the bed while he finishes getting dressed for the day. Huh, that’s unusual of Louis. He doesn’t seem like the kind of person that would suddenly change plans. Harry briefly spares a thought that he hopes Louis is alright. 

It’s early still, fifteen minutes before Louis normally shows up at his door. Harry continues with his morning routine, making up his breakfast and some tea. He sits at the breakfast bar in his kitchen and opens his laptop while he eats. He opens his email, and sure enough, there is an email from Louis. 

The email contains a list of links and a handful of attached files. There’s a mixture of videos, academic articles, and PDF files of scanned book pages. The videos mostly cover combat styles and techniques of gladiators, while the articles and books give an in-depth review of gladiator history. Harry presses play on the first video, but he pauses after a few minutes to grab a notebook and a pen. He’d only started to research gladiators briefly before he auditioned for _Redemption in Rome_ and hadn’t had much time since to continue investigating. It seems that Louis has done some excellent research that could help Harry learn a lot about the role he’s taking on. The videos keeps Harry’s interest for the entire morning. 

He loses track of time. He has saved all the documents to read later and is focused on watching the videos, as Louis had asked. He’s so absorbed into the current video that he startles when the doorbell rings. It’s just past eleven and Louis is rocking restlessly from foot to foot as he waits for the door to open. 

As soon as Harry waves him in, Louis’ energy fills the foyer. “So, I know I missed a few hours of training. Sorry for the short notice,” he starts rambling as he goes into the kitchen and starts to make himself some tea. “I had a sudden thing come up. I’ll tell you about it later. I hate to not show up for training, but I couldn’t put it off. How was your morning? Did you watch those videos I sent?” 

Finally Louis takes a breath and Harry is able to process the flurry of energy that is Louis. He responds, “I did. Thank you for sending all of that.”

“No problem. I like to do a lot of research beforehand. Have you done much research into your role yet?” The kettle comes to a boil and Louis pours two mugs of tea. He seems intent to make idle small talk and enjoy his tea before pushing them into the gym. It’s strange to Harry that Louis has so much energy this morning. He’s more talkative than normal and a bit more fidgety. Harry puts it down to not being able to get out the excess energy from their usual morning workout. The missed session had the opposite effect on Harry though. Spending the morning watching videos on the couch has rendered him more tired and sluggish than he’d been the past few days. 

As Harry finishes the last of his tea and places their used mugs in the sink, Louis remains seated at the breakfast bar. He’s still fidgety. He watches as Louis opens his mouth slightly, and then shakes his head and looks down where he;s wringing his hands. Harry gets the feeling that he is meaning to say something, but doesn’t know how to say it. Finally, as Harry is about to suggest they hit the gym, Louis speaks up.

“H, I have something to talk to you about.” Harry leans on the counter, facing Louis. Louis tucks a bit of his fringe off his face nervously. “I know this past week has been pretty stressful for you, with the drastic changes to your schedule and the pressures from your team. And while you’ve gotten some of the foundations down already, you’re not nearly as far as I’d hoped you’d be.”

“But-” Harry starts to interject that he’s trying his best, but Louis shakes his head minutely.

“No Harry, just let me talk for a sec. You’re doing so much, but your team keeps distracting you. You’re not getting to focus on your training, on preparing for your role, when your team keeps pulling your attention in a hundred different directions. We don’t have much time left to get you fully trained, but it’s still possible.”

“Okay.” Harry is worried where this is going. Louis’ apprehension in this conversation is palpable, from fidgeting with his hair to shaking his leg. 

“I spoke with Liam.”

Alarm bells sound in Harry’s head. His mind is on the defense, racing through all the possibilities of why Louis would get Liam involved. “When did you talk to Liam?”

“This morning. That’s why I was late. I had to let him know that you can’t continue to train like this.”

“I can train like this, I’ll do better. I’m sorry it’s not been easy, but I can do better.” Harry is worried that Louis is ready to walk away from this. The production company would be furious with him if the best stunt coordinator refused want to work with him. And Harry’s already become quite close to Louis. He couldn’t imagine training with someone else at this point. He thought their sessions had been going well.

“No, Harry, you are doing your best.” Louis offers a sincere smile. “I can see how hard you’re trying in our sessions. But sometimes there are other factors that can impede your progress. In our case, the environment just isn’t working.” 

“What do you mean? Is it my gym? We can go to another gym...”

“No, it’s not your gym. Your gym is a dream, and I’d love to stay here. What I mean is, you’re too close to all the other work around you in LA. That’s why I asked Liam if I could take you away for the rest of the month. A training retreat, of sorts.” Louis stands tall, daring Harry to contend his decision.

Harry is dumbfounded, shocked into silence. What did he mean by a training retreat? Where would they go? What about all the commitments his team had lined up? Harry starts mentally scrolling through his agenda, all the interviews and pap outings that his team has arranged for months in advance.

“You’re overthinking this H.” Louis smirks.

“They’ll never agree to let me go. Not for that long.” Harry deflates, leaning into the counter.

“But they already have.” Harry raises his eyebrows in surprise. “Liam was in full agreement. You have a good agent, by the way. He cares a lot about you. Anyway. He agreed to work it out with your team and cancel all your pending duties for the rest of the month, so that you could train full time, away from distractions.”

“But how?” Harry was still in disbelief, he hadn’t been able to get away from his team in years, not since he’d snagged his first big role.

“Liam knew your contracts front and back. He was much better at explaining all this legal stuff than I am, but basically he said that the production company’s contract supersedes any other promotional or managerial contract. So if the movie’s production schedule or anything related to the movie requires you to be away for a month, then your management company must make allowances.” 

“Oh.” Harry could hardly believe this. The prospect of being able to get away from his busy Hollywood life for a few weeks was very enticing. But he had a few concerns too. “Where will we go?”

“I might know of a place.” Louis smirks. “Anyway, time to hit the gym. Let’s go!” He takes off jogging down the hall to the gym. Harry catches himself ogling the way his gym shorts ride up his thighs as he moves. He shakes his head of the image and then follows Louis to the gym.

The rest of the day, Louis refuses to answer any of Harry’s questions. despite his numerous inquiries, Louis refuses to divulge any details about their upcoming retreat.

\- - -

Bags packed, plane boarded, and headphones in, Harry stares out of the small window in the private jet. Louis has somehow arranged a private jet to fly them to his mysterious location that he refuses to disclose to Harry.

One long phone call to Liam yesterday afternoon had reassured Harry that he was indeed free to follow Louis to his secret, remote training location. Liam knew of the location, but refused to tell Harry, as Louis had sworn him to secrecy. Harry is nervous to be leaving his LA responsibilities for so long. And as the plane takes off heading north, he is worried that he is about to end up in some Rocky Balboa-esque training montage in the middle of a frozen tundra in Canada.

The pilot announces their take off and informs them that the flight should take around two hours. Harry settles into his seat, pulling out a book he’d been meaning to read. Louis is seated across the aisle from him, headphones in and clicking through the movie options on the screen in front of him.

The plane lands on a small municipal runway, about two hours later. A rental car is waiting near the airport office building. As Louis and Harry carry their bags over to the car, Harry still can’t place where they are, other than north. There are mountains and pine trees and wilderness for miles in every direction. They could be anywhere from Northern California to somewhere in Canada. Wherever they are, one thing is certain. It’s definitely not LA. 

Louis drives, winding the rental car through the foothills and forests. One of Louis’ playlists plays over the car’s bluetooth, a good mix of Oasis, Vampire Weekend, and a couple of bands Harry’s never heard of fill the miles of silence. Forty-five minutes later they exit the highway and arrive in a small town. There is just one main street, aptly named “Main Street” that is four blocks long. 

They stop at the general store to stock up on groceries. Louis walks through the store like he’s on a mission, stocking their cart with healthy foods and essentials for cooking. They load the groceries into the back of the car and then set off again. 

Harry watches as the small town shrinks into the rearview and is replaced with nothing but nature. He’d hoped they’d be staying close to town, but as the miles add up and the houses are spaced further apart, Harry realizes he is really in the middle of nowhere. Then a thought strikes him, he tries to covertly check his phone. He doesn’t want to draw attention to his phone, as it was the main source of stress between them over the past week. Even though he knows his anxiety is unfounded, he worries Louis will think that he is too attached to his phone.

He pulls his phone out and holds it low, typing in the passcode one-handed to unlock the screen. Just as he suspected, he has one bar - strike that - no bars of service. The last bit of signal fades out as the realization hits him. There is no signal, no data, no internet. He is completely off-the-grid. 

The reality of suddenly unplugging from his digital world doesn’t cause a panic like he’d anticipated, but instead a calmness settles. His team can’t reach him. He won’t see any tweets analyzing his every move. The paparazzi won’t have a chance at catching him in an awkward pose as he walks out of some hipster cafe. He doesn’t have to answer to anyone but himself. Well, and Louis. 

This thought does cause a slight panic to rise in the back of his chest. He is going to be alone in a cabin in the middle of nowhere with Louis for three weeks. He was used to spending time with Louis, has gotten used to his daily presence in his life. He even looks forward to their sessions. But he isn’t prepared for this kind of proximity. He isn’t prepared for being around Louis 24/7. He will have to try harder to contain this rampant crush and reign in his racy thoughts. He doesn’t know how he will cope. 

Louis must misread his panic as restlessness from their hours of travelling. “We’re almost there. Just ten more minutes.” 

Harry tries to focus on the road, the surroundings, anything except the reality that awaits him when they arrive wherever it is that Louis is taking him. The road has narrowed significantly, and the tree line has encroached on the shoulder of the road. The pine trees are tall and dark, the forest beyond the tree line dense and ominous. Finally, the tree line widens and withdraws to form a driveway. Louis turns in. An old decrepit fence borders the gravel driveway as they wind back into the clearing in the forest. 

“It looks quite haunted.” Harry says as a large log cabin comes into view.

“Well, there were always stories about witches and goblins stealing children in the forest when I was growing up, so…” Louis parks the car near the cabin and turns off the engine.

Harry gets goosebumps as he stares out into the forest. “It’s like Hansel and Gretel, but without the candy.”


	4. Chapter 4

Louis wakes just before sunrise, the sky still an inky blue as he takes a seat on the porch step to eat his breakfast. Birds sing in the distance, calling out to the early morning as the sun breaks over the horizon. A squirrel scampers through the yard, just feet in front of Louis. Behind him, the screen door screeches open, announcing Harry’s arrival. 

“Morning.” Louis greets him, scooching over on the step to allow Harry room to sit. He looks cozy in a big hooded sweatshirt with the sleeves pulled low over his hands. He’s holding two steaming mugs of tea in his hands and hands one to Louis. “Thanks.”

“Morning.” Harry says, then covers his mouth as he yawns, mouth gaping wide behind his hand. “S’cuse me.”

“Did you sleep alright?”

“Yeah, it’s good. So, this is your family’s cabin?” Harry asks. He pulls a banana out of the front pocket of the hoodie and begins peeling it.

“Yeah. It was my grandfather’s cabin, but he died when I was in secondary school. I grew up in Yorkshire, but we’d come out here every summer to visit. Our family is spread out more now, so we don’t get together as much as they used to.”

“Oh, Yorkshire. I’m from Cheshire. I moved to LA once my career took off. It’s so cool that you got to spend summers here.” 

“I remember chasing my sisters and cousins around the yard and climbing the trees when I wanted to get away from them. And every Sunday we’d go into town to go to church and the general store. It’s so different here.”

“Yeah, I’ve never been anywhere this rural. The most we would do was go camping in a campground. It’s not the same when there’s dozens of other families all tenting in a field.”

They continue the conversation, sharing bits about their families, and memories of summer adventures. The sun is getting higher, breaking through the dense forest around the cabin. They both finish their breakfasts, but neither gets up from the stairs. 

There’s a quiet lull in the conversation, a companionable silence. It’s not as awkward as Louis thought it would be. Louis had been concerned about bringing Harry to the cabin. Would they get on each other’s nerves after so much time together? Or, would they have anything other than their training to talk about during their down time? But the time spent travelling yesterday has eased his worries. They get on very well and have a lot in common. Louis likes spending time with Harry. They might even be good friends by the end of stay.

“So, what’s on the agenda for today?” Harry asks, breaking the silence.

“Well, we still need to train. Our schedule will mostly stay the same, but some of the ways we train will need to change since we couldn’t pack up your lovely gym and bring everything with us. And we can incorporate a few things that wouldn’t be necessary, or possible, if we were still in the city.”

“Like what?” Harry asks.

“Well, for starters, we’re going to need some firewood.” Louis laughs at Harry’s shocked expression. “It could get pretty chilly up here at night.” 

After washing up their breakfast dishes, they meet out back behind the house for their lesson. They spend the rest of the morning reviewing the previous week’s lessons, but it doesn’t go well. 

“It’s like you’ve forgotten everything. Maybe the fresh mountain air has gotten to you!” Louis laughs as Harry trips up again during one of the sequences that Harry had practiced last week. Louis is careful not to be too critical of Harry’s poor performance. Louis wonders if it is the change in scenery, the impact of the stress from last week, or just that Harry isn’t trying as hard as he originally thought, but there’s definitely something holding Harry back now that they aren’t in his own gym. 

“Hey, that’s not fair. I’m trying.” Harry lowers his prop sword and pouts his bottom lip exaggeratedly.

“I know you are. But we are a bit behind schedule, so you’ll have to retrain your two left feet quickly so we can keep practicing. Let’s try that sequence again.” Harry gets into position, checking that his feet are correctly spaced shoulder width apart and then raises his sword. Louis takes note of the way he’s shifting his weight, the stern look of concentration that creases his brow, and the impercision with which he swings the sword forward into the lunge. 

Harry follows through but lands his right foot in an uneven patch of grass causing him to wobble before righting himself. “Fuck, that was horrible!” Harry tosses down the sword. 

They’ve been at this for hours and Harry just isn’t getting anywhere with the sword fighting skills today. Louis knows when to cut his losses. And besides, it’s lunchtime. “Ok, that was a good start. We-” 

“No it wasn’t.” Harry interrupts.

“Harry, it’s alright. let’s break for lunch and we can come back to this later. We’ll get you up to speed in no time.” Louis grabs both of the prop swords and heads toward the house, leaving Harry alone in the yard.

Lunch is awkwardly quiet. Harry chooses to avoid conversation, only offering up one or two word responses to the questions Louis asks. His sudden change in behavior, coupled with the earlier struggles during their lesson, concerns Louis. 

Louis senses that something is holding Harry back. He doesn’t know if Harry feels okay staying in an unfamiliar house, or if he was comfortable this far removed from the city. Maybe bringing Harry out to the cabin was a bad move. But then again, leaving Harry in LA surrounded by the toxic energy and constant pressure of the industry wasn’t an option either. 

Louis suggests an afternoon yoga session while they’re cleaning up their lunch dishes. Louis asks Harry to lead the practice. Louis hopes that the familiarity might help settle Harry into their training sessions at the cabin. Maybe if Harry talks through an hour of yoga he’ll be more willing to talk about other issues. 

They unfurl their yoga mats on the large back patio. The afternoon sun is high overhead, but a few scattered clouds offer brief moments of shade. The September heat is mild up in the mountains and it’s not too hot for an outdoor workout. 

Louis follows Harry’s slow guidance as they shift through a series of poses. Their breathing deepens and fills the silence between each of Harry’s commands. As they move from Warrior I to Warrior II pose, Louis notices the shifting of muscles beneath Harry’s tight workout shirt. His long arms flex into the new pose. Sunlight shines on his heated skin, highlighting the dark shapes of his tattoos. Louis misses the next pose called out and he shakes his head to refocus. He watches Harry carefully to figure it out. Harry drops his right arm toward his outstretched right leg and raises his left arm high in a fluid transition to triangle pose. Louis tries to focus on his breathing as he twists his arms into the new pose. His mind continues to wander back toward the graceful shapes of Harry’s poses and before Louis knows it, they’re laying on their mats in Savasana for a cool down. 

Their last bit of training for the day comes after dinner. The setting sun filters through the trees, casting a golden glow over the yard. There’s a slight chill to the evening breeze. Louis asks Harry to follow him outside. 

“We’re gonna need some firewood to heat the cabin at night if the temperature drops,” Louis says. While it’s still warm during the day, and there is a heat wave predicted to roll through during the middle of next week, nights in the mountains could get chilly this time of year. “It’s better to be prepared than have to chop wood while freezing your balls off.” 

Harry offers a small smile at his attempt at humor, but doesn’t respond. Louis grabs a maul and two pairs of safety glasses out of the shed behind the cabin and carries it over to the chopping block.

“My uncles sometimes use the cabin for hunting later in the fall. But they haven’t been up here since last winter so the wood pile is running low. Luckily there’s still some cut logs from trees that had fallen years ago when my grandfather still lived up here.” Louis points to side of where there’s neat stacks of split and unsplit logs under a lean-to. “We can spilt some of those to restock the pile.” 

Louis hefts a log from the unsplit pile and carries it to the old stump that his uncles had always used as a chopping block. He explains the basics of splitting wood, gets into position, and swings the maul. The sharp crack of the impact echoes around the yard and the first piece falls away. He readjusts the log and continues chopping until he’s got a small pile of split wood next to the stump. 

“Now it’s your turn.” 

“Alright.” He walks over to the log pile and returns with another log. Louis hands off the maul to Harry, who looks intimidated by the tool. He steps up to the chopping block and spreads his legs shoulder-width apart like Louis had explained. He raises the maul and looks to Louis for approval.

“Here, move your right hand closer to the top.” Louis reaches out and adjusts Harry’s hand. “Loosen your grip. There.” 

Louis steps back and lets Harry take a swing. He makes contact, splitting the log halfway. “That was good. Now you just try to aim for the same spot to finish.” Harry swings again. This time the piece of wood successfully falls away. Harry seems to be a natural at this. 

Harry turns the remainder of the log and swings again. This time the swing misses, the maul nicks the edge of the stump. “Shit.” Harry sighs.

“It’s alright. It takes some practice to get the aim right. Just remember to keep your feet back.”

After a few more swings land successfully, Harry seems to be enjoying the manual labor of the chore. He splits an entire log without missing a single swing. And Louis has started zoning out, noticing Harry’s arms instead of watching his technique for errors or dangers. He doesn’t need a repeat of earlier when he got lost in watching the strain of Harry’s muscles. He hopes Harry hasn’t caught him staring. That would be awkward. 

“You’ve seem to have the hang of it. I’ve got some things I need to check up on around the cabin. Do you mind if I leave you to it?”

“No, that’s fine. I think I’ve got it.” Harry grunts as he hoists a huge log onto the stump.

“I’ll just be a holler away if you need anything.” Louis gives a little wave as he walks off. 

Louis circles the outside of the cabin and the shed to make sure that there is nothing that needs to be fixed on either structure. After a quick survey and no apparent damage, he takes his time to walk the perimeter of the property and check the fence along the western edge. He reaches the farthest point of the land. Just feet from where the fence ends there’s what looks to be an overgrown path that leads into the forest.

A distant moment from his childhood surfaces. He’d chased his sisters around this part of the yard near the edge of this path numerous times. Louis smiles at the memory. Even back then, the path had looked unkempt. It was sprawling with overgrown bushes and unruly yellow wildflowers that his sisters would weave into golden crowns. His mother always warned them to never go down the path, worried that they’d lose their way in the dense forest. 

There’s still some of the yellow flowers, but most have wilted as the summer winds down. The green foliage has started to take on the golden hues that come with the beginning of autumn. 

A bird flies past him. He tracks the movement as the small brown bird swoops into the trees. But he loses the bird in the leaves. Then his eyes land on a something red. 

There is a sign staked next to the path. He’d almost missed it, as it’s surrounded by overgrown bushes. He steps closer to read it. It is weather faded and very hard to read, especially as it is growing darker outside. He brushes away a layer of dirt, revealing more of the red lettering that had originally caught his eye. 

“Keep Out!”

It is probably an old sign to mark the property line. Goosebumps pepper Louis’ arms. A light breeze must have picked up as the sun is setting. Louis rubs his arms for warmth and he turns back toward the cabin.

Harry has built up a decent pile of logs in the fifteen minutes that Louis was wandering the property. They work together to carry the logs to the lean-to. When they finish, it’s almost pitch black, the moon obscured by dense clouds. Louis puts the maul back and locks up the shed before they head inside for the night.


	5. Chapter 5

Harry is knackered. The unfamiliar swing of the maul makes his arms ache with the familiar soreness of a good workout. He needs a long, warm shower to wash away the grime and sweat from the chore and relax his muscles. 

As he soaps up, his thoughts drift to Louis. The way he looked soft and sleepy on the porch that morning. The way he confidently swung the maul while showing Harry how to split wood. The way his arse looked in his joggers as they had moved into downward dog during their yoga session. 

His thoughts unintentionally turn him on. His cock starting to harden against his hip. He sticks his face under the water, trying to rid himself of those thoughts.

Louis is essentially his superior right now. He is hired to teach Harry the skills and fight choreography for his film. They have to work and live together for the next three weeks and Harry doesn’t want his attraction to make things uncomfortable for Louis. 

He quickly rinses the soap off his body and hops out of the shower before he can let his mind stray any further. 

He dresses in some gray joggers and wanders into the kitchen, needing a glass of water. 

“Hey, want to watch a movie?” Louis calls over from the living room. The prospect of being near Louis for another two hours unnerves Harry. After catching himself staring and berating himself for his attraction for the whole day, he doesn’t have the energy.

“Not tonight. Think I’m just going to turn in.”

Louis offers an exaggerated pout. “Okay, good night! See you in the morning.”

Harry gently closes the door to his room. He props himself up in bed with the pillows and opens the book that he’s been reading. He’d gotten about a third of the way through during their flight and tries to get back into the story. But the training and chores from the day catch up to him. The lines on the page are swimming and his eyelids fall heavy, so he tucks his bookmark into the page and switches off the lamp darkness surrounding him. He still hasn’t adjusted to the eerie quietness of this rural cabin, but he barely notices tonight as he falls asleep almost as soon as his head hits the pillow.

\- - -

“Again!” Louis commands. Harry raises the prop sword and swarms toward Louis, angling the blade for an attack. The sword isn’t positioned quite right and Louis easily defends the attack and Harry stumbles to the side. He rights himself and lowers his sword to his side. Harry fidgets and wipes at the sweat beading on his brow.

He can tell Louis is getting frustrated. The lack of progress frustrates him too, but he doesn’t know how to prevent this.

Yesterday Louis had joked about Harry’s poor performance and lack of coordination. But today, every mistake is followed by more repetitions. Harry doesn’t blame him. He’s having trouble remembering his left foot from his right and any of the complex moves he has attempt end up with him falling down. 

It’s like a schoolyard crush on a boy. Every touch makes his heart stutter. Every compliment catches him off guard. And when Louis moves his limbs into a stance, adjusts his position, his breath catches in his throat. He watches Louis demonstrate the move, but forgets to note the movements, instead noticing the sheen of sweat on his arms, the strength of his arms, the thickness in his thighs. And he is nearly incapable of focusing on anything other than Louis’ thighs in those shorts. The black mesh fabric of the gym shorts hang loosely a few inches above his knee and tighten perfectly around his thighs. It’s very distracting.

He’s trying to be professional, not wanting Louis to be upset or uncomfortable because of Harry’s uncontrolled thirst. However, he just doesn’t know how to handle this crush, alternating between trying to subdue the attraction and being consumed by it. Either way, it’s effectively reduced his concentration to zero. 

“One more time.” Louis calls out.

\- - -

Harry wakes stuck to the sheets in his own sweat. The temperature rises steadily as they spend the morning in the yard practicing. By the time they complete their usual stretches and warm ups, they have both lost their sweat-drenched shirts.

Louis has a tattoo. Harry knows this. He’d seen the multitude of tattoos scribbled up his arms and has even seen bits of the lettering poke out from his shirts before. But Harry has never seen the chest piece unobstructed. It’s doing things to him. There’s something about the way the letters frame his collarbones and accentuate the breadth of his shoulders. Harry can’t take his eyes off it. 

At least it appears that Harry is paying attention while he’s admiring the ink. They are reviewing the same moves as yesterday. While Harry still hasn’t mastered the moves, he is able to connect a few of them. It’s not graceful. But it is progress.

They end practice early Unfortunately, the cabin offers no relief from the heat. Without air con and only one small fan to circulate the air, the small cabin is stifling. They bring an old blanket outside to lay in the grass and eat their cold sandwiches in the shade. After lunch they sprawl out on the blanket and talk about anything and everything, wasting away the afternoon until they can resume their training once the sun sets. 

Harry is unable to avoid being around Louis like he’d done the past two nights, so that plan is out the window. Luckily, they both put on dry shirts before making lunch, so there is one less distraction to deal with. It is difficult to restrain his attraction when everything Louis does and says draws Harry in like a magnet.

\- - -

The heat is still intolerable the following day, so they get up an hour before sunrise to maximize the cooler hours of the morning. They’re both yawning and tired, having slept poorly in the heat of the cabin. Despite the lack of energy, their training is still demanding. Harry makes small improvements over the course of the morning. Louis cheers him on every time he gets one of the complex sequences right and offers him words of encouragement when he makes a mistake. Harry finally feels a spark of confidence in his ability.

When they break for lunch, Harry is looking forward to spending time with Louis. He doesn’t hesitate to throw out the blanket under their tree. He decided late last night that if he can’t prevent his attraction, he might as well get his fill of time with Louis. And if he’s lucky, maybe the constant proximity will decrease the potency of his attraction. He is looking forward to more early morning breakfasts and late night movie sessions now that he is allowing himself time with Louis outside of their designated training. He just need to be careful, as he isn’t the most subtle when it comes to attraction.

\- - -

The heat wave finally departs on Thursday leaving behind rainstorms for the entire morning. The rain delays their usual outdoor lessons until after lunch. Instead, they opt for some indoor strength training since there is not enough room inside the cabin for the large sweeping motions of a sword fight.

The rain lets up in the afternoon. The humidity still clings to the air, but it has cooled off since the rain moved out. 

Harry goes to tie his hair up, away from his neck. He is growing out his hair for _ Redemption in Rome_, as the producers want Antonius the gladiator to have long hair. It’s nearly reached his shoulders already. It is difficult to deal with long hair during this hot, humid weather, but it’s better than having to wear wigs during filming.

He twists a hair tie around the gathered hair to secure it, but it snaps. “Fuck.” Harry doesn’t have another hair tie on him. He can’t remember if he even packed extras in his bag. 

“What’s wrong?” Louis asks.

“My hair tie broke.”

“Wait! I have some. Louis unzips his gym bag and rifles through one of the pockets. “Gotcha!” He whips out a small ring of hair bands in assorted colors. 

Harry takes one of the pink bands and hands the rest back to Louis. “Why do you have these?” He pulls his hair up into a bun. The relief is instant as a breeze cools his neck. 

“I try to keep some on hand. I have a lot of sisters. When I used to take them to gymnastics and dance classes and they always ended up forgetting the hair ties until we were at the gym. So I learned to be prepared.”

“What a thoughtful big brother,” Harry teases. He picks up his sword out of the gym bag and begins his usual warm up stretches.

\- - -

Harry idly picks at one of the nicks in the worn tabletop as he reviews the schedule. All of the documents Louis had given him on that first day are spread over the top of the small kitchen table. He double checks all the dates and the listed goals. As he suspected, he is so far behind where Louis expects him to be.

He is doing a good job of staying on the diet plan Louis created, mostly thanks to sharing mealtime with Louis, but that’s where the success stops. It’s coming up to the end of the second week and he hasn’t mastered any of the moves, still feels awkward and clumsy while wielding the prop sword, and they haven’t even started the hand-to-hand combat training that’s listed as one of the second week goals. And he doesn’t feel at all ready to tackle the full choreographed fight scenes that are listed for the coming week. 

Louis must be so patient, working with someone as incapable as Harry. Harry doesn’t know how he has been so kind and encouraging when he’s obviously not meeting the expectations. He throws the schedule into the mess of papers and drops his head into his hands. A tired sigh escapes. 

He hears the muffled noise of Louis’ alarm going off in the bedroom down the hall. It startles him out of his self-pity party. 

As he shuffles all the papers together, he vows to work harder in practice to make it up to Louis. He tucks the papers into the folder and carries it to his bedroom. He decides to start on breakfast to keep himself busy. Louis comes into the kitchen fully dressed but with pillow lines still marking his face. 

“Good morning,” Louis says, “What’s cooking?”

“Just some scrambled eggs.” Harry stirs the contents of the pan, not bothering to look up at Louis.

“Smells amazing. You didn’t have to cook, but thank you.”

After breakfast, they get outside. It is early, dew still wet on the grass. Harry picks up his sword and tosses the other to Louis. He’s determined to make the most of this practice and prove to Louis that he is capable of learning and will be ready to learn the choreography next week, right on schedule. He pushes himself extra, adding more force to each swing and more power to each lunge forward. He feels the exertion burning in his thighs and arms. He tracks Louis’ movements like he’d been taught, as if he was a predator out chasing his next kill. 

Louis steps up his game in response, and they’re both panting and drenched in sweat earlier than usual. Louis seems to catch on that Harry is trying harder. He looks concerned as their swords collide in a cross in between them. The collision reverberates down the plastic prop swords and stings Harry’s hand on the hilt. 

“Harry, remember to pace yourself.” Louis steps back in a defensive move. “We’re just practicing, this isn’t actually life or death.” Louis laughs half-heartedly.

They’re in the midst of a duel, swords clashing and feet constantly moving as they circle each other. Harry tries to incorporate one of the more complicated moves that Louis had covered yesterday. It involves a lunge and a twist to trick the opponent into defending the wrong side and leaving their other side open to attack. Louis said it would be one of the most impressive moves once Harry is in front of the camera because there is so much movement to the twist that it will capture really well, and be dynamic and dramatic on film. 

Louis takes aim and Harry successfully defends himself, taking a big step back. He sees his opening, ready to demonstrate that he knows the new move. He lunges forward and twists. His foot slip out beneath him, sliding across the dew slick grass and taking him down hard. He lands on his ass, his right leg stretched out a bit too far from the slip. He can feel the moisture seep through his workout shorts. He throws the sword down angrily and pounds his fists into the ground. “Dammit, I had that.”

Louis offers him his hand to pull him up. “Guess we should wait until the grass has more time to dry off. Let’s go over a few new moves so we can take it slower. Less risk of wiping out that way.”

Louis leads him over to the patio, the dry ground offering more traction for practicing footing. Louis ducks into the cabin for a moment and returns with one of his training bags. It’s larger than the one he keeps the swords stored in and it piques Harry’s curiosity. Louis unzips the bag and removes two shields. 

The shields must be mock props like the swords that they have been practicing with. They are small and round, about two feet in diameter. They are made of plain, light weight, grey plastic. with a fabric handle attached to the back. 

Harry recognizes the shape of the shields from some of the early concept art he’d seen while auditioning for the film. In the battles in the film, Harry will be in full gladiator costume, from the sandals to the helmet. And he will be carrying his metal gladius along with a small shield. He doesn’t know why he didn’t realize the shield was missing from their practice until Louis brought them out. 

“Shields? Why weren’t we practicing with them earlier?” Harry asks, genuinely confused.

“I wanted to focus on just the sword techniques to start with.” Louis says. He hands over one of the shields and Harry grabs it. He grips the shield by the handle with his non-dominant hand and holds it up. Despite its lightness, the added weight feels foreign. 

“Are there lots of new moves to learn with the shield?” Harry asks. The schedule he reviewed this morning flashes in his mind. He will not have enough time to master all the techniques in the two weeks they have left if they keep adding new things.

“Nothing new, but you’ll have to get used to holding the shield and knowing when to use it to defend yourself. It doesn’t require much skill and the audience won’t be paying attention to how you use the shield anyway. The most important part is still the sword because it requires precision to attack your opponent and it will be the focus of the scene. Okay!” Louis claps his hands once. “Let’s start with the basics.” 

Harry adjusts his stance and raises his shield and they begin. Adding the shield is a whole new problem for Harry. How can adding one simple object reverse all of the progress he’s made over the past week?

The shield throws off his balance and he trips more than usual. He’s off-kilter and awkward as he tries to move around. Harry is frustrated by his lack of control. And Louis keeps correcting him with gentle reminders and frequent touches. It’s driving Harry crazy. 

Every time Louis steps in to correct his stance or his grip on the sword, he reaches out. His focus unconsciously narrows into the points of contact and erase his ability to pay attention. He can’t be expected to listen to instructions when Louis’ hand is on his arm. His shoulder. His back.

“Harry you’re overcompensating for the shield by leaning too far right.” Louis comes forward and places his palm on Harry’s shoulder to straighten his stance. “Try to keep your torso centered, just like we’ve practiced.” 

“Okay.” Harry says. His hand is only on his shoulder for a brief second, but the touch is seared into his skin when Louis takes his hand away. Harry tries again. This time the shield smacks awkwardly against his left leg as he lunges forward and Louis stops him again.

“Raise your left arm higher,” Louis holds his elbow and raises his arm. “Like this.” Louis’ touch lingers a moment too long before he steps back so Harry can try again. Harry doesn’t know if he can take much more of this. Why is Louis being so tactile? He has gotten used to the occasional brief touches over the past week, but this lesson is getting out of hand. And it’s starting to affect Harry.

In the next move, he even forgets which hand holds the sword and ends up charging Louis with the shield lifted. The puzzled look on Louis’ face turns to uncontrollable laughter after Harry realizes his silly mistake. “Oops.”

“I can’t believe you tried to attack with your shield!” Louis doubles over. Harry blushes. 

They carry on with the new movements until the sun is high above the cabin and Harry’s stomach grumbles loudly. Louis wraps up the morning training by saying he thinks Harry has made great progress. Harry doesn’t agree, but doesn’t correct him either.

After lunch they duel. Louis suggests that the practice battle will help Harry learn to move naturally while holding the shield. They duel for over an hour and it becomes clear that Harry still can’t put the moves into practice. He keeps leaning to the side, hitting his leg with the shield, and tripping over his feet. Each duel ends with Louis delivering a pretend fatal blow to Harry’s midsection and declaring victory. 

On the fourth duel, Harry gets distracted and Louis takes the opportunity to advance and tackle him to the ground. 

Louis growls as he sprints forward and tackles Harry. He holds his gladius to Harry’s neck, “Surrender.” He stares fiercely into Harry's eyes, challenging him to fight back despite the blade at his throat.

Louis seems unaware of the distress he’s causing Harry as he is poised on top of him. Not only has Harry failed again, but now he’s getting hard. If Louis would happen to sit back just an inch, everything would be revealed. He holds his breath, not daring to move a muscle. Harry is so ashamed as he sits there motionless, praying that Louis will roll off and end their session. 

Thankfully, Louis does just that, swinging his leg over Harry’s torso and hopping up off the ground quickly. He offers an outstretched hand to help Harry up, but Harry pretends not to notice and quickly pushes himself off the ground by himself. He brushes some of the loose grass from his clothes and shakes out his hair. 

The rest of the practice, Harry is extremely bad at everything. They try to practice a few lighter sequences, but Harry is very distracted and frustrated. The training just goes downhill from there. After yet another wrong move, Harry throws his sword onto the ground angrily. 

“Haz, it’s okay. We’ll just try again,” Louis says. 

“No it’s not okay. Every time you add a new move, it’s like I’ve forgotten everything else. It’s like two steps forward one step back.” Harry scowls.

“That’s still one step forward, At least you're making progress,” Louis consoles.

“But it’s slow progress and I'm so far behind schedule. I checked this morning. I’m five days behind your schedule and we’re running out of time.” Harry drags his fingers through his hair.

“We’re not running out of time. Since we have more time each day to work out the training shifted. And you have been making progress. You look more natural holding the sword and your footing is getting better.”

“Don’t lie. I can’t keep up and you know it.” Harry’s chest tightens. “We’re never gonna meet the goals and I won’t be ready for this movie when filming starts. I’m going to be the reason production gets behind, and then the producers are going to think I’m a horrible actor.” 

“Harry, stop. That’s not true. Where is this coming from?” Louis moves toward him, reaching out a hand to comfort him. Harry backs away from the touch, pulling his arm back suddenly.

“Don’t go easy on me. You’ve probably been thinking it.” 

“I’m not going easy on you. Why would you think that?.”

“Yes, you are. Just tell me I’m horrible at this.” Harry sweeps his arms out wide, inviting a verbal crucifixion. 

“I won’t, because you’re not.” Louis tries to meet Harry’s eyes, but Harry avoids his gaze. 

“God, I don’t know how you put up with me.” Harry’s face closes off before he storms off. He slams the door to the cabin without a single glance back toward Louis. 

He goes into his bedroom and shuts the door. He’s sweaty from practice and itchy from being in the grass, but he’s too defeated to do anything about it. He deserves the discomfort anyway. He sits on the floor at the foot of the bed, back against the footboard and knees pulled to his chest. The silence of being alone brings on the guilt of the argument. Now that he’s removed from the situation, he knows that everything Louis was saying was in good faith. Louis is honestly one of the nicest people Harry has ever met and Harry is embarrassed that he accused Louis of lying to him. He didn’t deserve Harry’s poor attitude or the hair trigger reaction to a minor slip up. He shouldn’t be taking all his frustrations out on Louis, but the pressure of this was getting to be too much. 

He falls asleep on the bed, star fished on top of the handmade quilt. He wakes about an hour later and can hear Louis making dinner. He lays in silence, still not ready to face Louis after everything that went down. 

Louis knocks on the door inviting him to eat. Harry doesn’t respond. Louis must take that to mean he’s still asleep, as he doesn’t try again. 

He sits up in bed and stares blankly at the wall across from him. There’s a dresser pressed against the wall. He’d opened his suitcase against the top of the dresser and splayed all his clothes out. He zones out, staring at the zipper of the suitcase. And then he remembers that he’d stashed a bit of weed in the inside pocket of the toiletry bag. There’s no time like the present to get high and try to forget about how horribly the afternoon had gone. He cracks the window and chair next to it, taking slow pulls from the tightly rolled joint. 

He doesn’t know how long it's been, but it couldn’t have been too long, when he hears Louis get into the shower. Suddenly, Harry knows he needs to make his escape while Louis isn’t in the living room to ask questions or to check on him. He pulls one last drag on the joint and snuffs out the stub in the water glass he’s been using as a makeshift ashtray. 

He slips on his shoes and silently closes the door behind him.

He doesn’t know where he is headed. He decides to turn left, walking until he comes to the edge of the forest. It’s darker near the edge of the trees. The setting sun is blocked by the forest on the other side of the cabin, casting this end of the yard in deep shadow. There’s just enough light that Harry can wander around without tripping. 

There is an old fence bordering the forest here, weathered boards held up by sturdy posts. The lichen covered wood is being swallowed by the mass of undergrowth in the forest, long since forgotten with no one to tame the forest. It’s actually quite beautiful in an abandoned way, like those pictures of dilapidated barns or derelict shopping malls that Harry sometimes looks at on Instagram. 

He follows along the old fence, imagining the person that built it. Probably Louis’ grandfather, years and years ago. Maybe he used the leftover lumber from building the cabin to mark the property line. Or maybe it was once part of a pasture, meant to keep horses from wandering off. Harry loses himself in the imagination, playing out an entire scene in his mind. A young man hard at work building the fence. His young wife walking up with their toddler on her hip to call him in for lunch. The man, older now, showing his son how to mend the fence. Life would have been simpler for them. 

Harry sighs. He has walked nearly the entire perimeter of the garden, but he’s not ready to go back into the cabin, not ready to face Louis. He continues on. And then there is a break in the fence. It’s only about one meter from where the fence ends to where it starts back up. There is no gate. Why would there be a space in the fence? If there were horses, they would have gotten out. Or the man’s children could have gotten lost in the forest. Harry looks past the fence and is surprised to find the faintest of paths. It’s not marked and barely noticeable under all of the bushes and vines that have reclaimed the path. But it is a path. 

It piques Harry’s curiosity. So he follows it. A gust of wind blows and goosebumps pop up along his arms, despite the mild temperature. 

It takes a bit of effort to get through the underbrush. He trips a few times in the low light and he has to crawl over two fallen trees that block the path, but all in all it is a fairly easy hike. The terrain is mostly flat with a slight downward slope as he gets further away from the cabin. There’s also a lot of birds chirping away in the canopy as Harry trudges down the path. It’s very peaceful. 

He hikes for about five minutes and is contemplating turning back. He could always come back to explore tomorrow when the sun is higher. Then he hears running water. The babbling of water trickling over rocks. Like a fountain. No, like a waterfall. Harry wants to see if there is a hidden waterfall. He continues, searching for the source. It’s not far. Just ahead there is a small stream winding and bending through the forest. Harry follows the banks, careful of soft mud or loose rocks. The stream brings him to a pond. It’s roughly the size of a football pitch and surrounded by tall trees on every side. The babbling water sound is loudest where the stream empties into the pond. It is a waterfall, but nowhere near as massive as Harry hoped. It’s only about two feet above the surface, the water splashing down to become part of the pond. 

The water looks inviting. It would feel fantastic to rinse off the sticky sweaty remnants of the day and relax in the pond. It’s been so long since Harry has had a chance to fully relax and enjoy a relaxing swim. All of his most recent trips to the beach have been accompanied by pushy paps looking to capture a high-paying shot. Here, he’s completely alone and the water calls to him. 

Without hesitation, Harry kicks off his shoes and strips off his clothes, neatly folding his shirt and shorts and stacking them on a nearby fallen tree trunk. He tiptoes toward the shore, avoiding sharp rocks and stray twigs. The water is shallow and warm. The sandy bottom is a bit siltier than the beaches he’s used to, but the water is clear. He wades in up to his thighs. 

He hadn’t considered that there might be leeches or deadly algae in the pond until he’s already up to his waist. At this point, even piranhas couldn’t deter him. The water feels so refreshing on his skin. He wades out to the middle of the pond, where his feet are just barely touching the soft mud at the bottom. No part of the pond is deeper than Harry is tall, but it is enough to float around a bit and get his hair wet. He removes the pink hair tie from his little bun, loose hair falling around his face. He pulls the hair tie on his wrist for safe-keeping. He plugs his nose, bends his knees, and throws his head back. He dunks his full body beneath the surface of the pond. He holds his breath for a moment under the water, feeling the pressure of water cocooning him. When his lungs burn he resurfaces, slicking his hair back behind him with the weight of the water. 

He takes a deep inhale and wipes the water from his eyes. When he opens his eyes, the pond is glowing blue. That can’t be right. He shakes his head and closes his eyes. He counts to three. When he opens them again, everything is still cast in the soft blue light emanating from the pond. He must be seeing things. Hallucinating. There must have been something else in his weed. At least this unintended hallucination is beautiful.

He takes it all in. The pond glows a soft blue, bright like the cerulean crayon, or like Louis’ eyes when he watched Harry during training. It’s a lovely color. He looks at his hands submerged under the glowing water. It is otherworldly, with the mystical blue light dancing off the contours of his tanned skin. Further out, the blue light illuminates everything around the pond. The ethereal light shimmers off of the tree leaves and the surrounding trees appear larger than life with the light emanating from the pond below. Harry feels small, but not afraid. He floats around in the water, swimming in a few small circles and enjoying the unique beauty of this mysterious glow. It’s the most surreal experience. 

The unnatural glow does not stick around. It fades out just minutes after it had appeared. Harry watches in awe as the blue glow retreats from the shores and into the pond. He spins in a circle, captivated by the disappearing light. It all seems to be coming toward him, slowly collecting in the middle of the pond where he is standing. The light gains intensity as it gathers in a ring around him. It flairs once, a bright flash of white light. And then it is gone. 

Harry blinks a few times to get rid of the spots left by the intense white flash. His mind feels a bit clearer now too, his high must have faded along with the hallucinated glow. It was a bizarre high, but he can’t fathom any other explanation for the intensity of this experience.

The absence of the glowing water makes the surrounding forest appear even darker than before. The sun must have already set while Harry had been swimming around. He tips his head back toward the sky. Thousands of stars surrounding a full moon glitter above him . There are layers and colors and depth that have always been cloaked by light pollution. It’s breath-taking. But it also means that he has been out here a lot longer than he had originally planned. He hopes that Louis hasn’t realized he is missing. He doesn’t want to worry him. 

He wades out of the water. Back on the dry banks of the pond, he uses his shirt to dry off the best he can before pulling on his shorts and shoes. He wrings the excess water from his hair and pulls it back into a damp bun. And then he starts the hike back to the cabin.

It’s more difficult this time around, heading slightly uphill in the dark. At least there is a full moon. Without its light, it would be nearly impossible to find the faint path along the stream that Harry had hiked down. He takes his time, even more cautious of tripping than he had been on the hike down. His cautiousness pays off, as he makes it back to the garden without a single scrape. Near the opening of the fence, he finds a few yellow flowers that haven’t died off for the season. He picks one and plans to press it in his journal. He twirls the short stem in his hands as he heads back to the cabin.

The cabin is dark. Louis must already be asleep. Harry’s stomach growls loudly in the empty kitchen, a reminder that he’d skipped dinner before he’d gone on his impromptu hike. It is past ten and if Louis is asleep, he doesn’t want to make noise in an attempt to cook something. Luckily, Louis has left a small plate of dinner in the fridge and he eats the cold leftovers. He finishes off his strange night with a quick shower before he climbs into his bed. Once he drifts to sleep, he dreams of the mystical blue pond.


	6. Chapter 6

Louis wakes up feeling groggy despite getting more than eight hours of sleep the night before. He allows himself a rare few minutes of lying in bed. It is his day off, after all. There is a bright sliver of light coming through the gap in the curtain, landing directly across his face. He turns away from it, curling around a spare pillow and attempting to fall back asleep. But, he is uncomfortable. 

He lies in bed a bit longer but cannot find a comfortable position now that he is awake. He is restless, with sore legs, a scratchy throat, and a foggy head. It’s almost as if he has a slight hangover. Maybe he’s coming down with something. It would be unfortunate to get sick in the middle of this job, as they still have so much to work on before filming starts.

Louis has a quiet morning on the porch. He eats a light breakfast and makes a mental list of everything they need to buy when they go into town later. He can’t help but notice that Harry stays in bed all morning, sleeping past noon. It’s a bit strange as Harry had slept through dinner last night too. Maybe he is exhausted from all of their training. Or, maybe he is staying in his room to avoid Louis. He hopes it is not the latter. 

Louis is concerned that Harry is withdrawing after his outburst yesterday. Harry should be able to talk to someone, a friend or his agent, anyone, about what he is going through. But with their seclusion while up here at the cabin, it is not easy. He hopes that the stress of their full training schedule isn’t becoming too much for him.

Louis decides to check in on Harry. He does so under the guise of inviting him to go into town. If they plan on going to town, they should get going soon, anyway. Louis knocks on the door.

A very soft, sleepy Harry answers. “Morning, what time is it?” Harry rubs the sleep from his eyes.

“Noon. I am planning to go into town this afternoon. Do you want to come with?” 

“Sure. I’ll be out in a minute. Let me get dressed.”

The long ride into town is quiet. Louis puts on his favorite playlist. He wants to talk with Harry, but he doesn’t know how to start the conversation. But in the end it’s Harry that breaks the silence.

“I’m sorry about yesterday.” Harry says, staring straight ahead at the road as he drives.

“It’s not-” 

Harry cuts him off. “No, I should apologize. I was really stressing out and said things I shouldn’t have. You’ve been really great and it wasn’t fair of me to take my frustration out on you.”

“I understand, thanks for apologizing. And I really meant it yesterday when I said you are making good progress.” There’s an awkward pause, like Harry wants to disagree but is keeping his comment to himself. “And, you’re not a horrible actor.” Louis adds. “I’ve worked with some very horrible actors, and you don’t even come close.”

“Yeah? Like who?” Harry brightens, glancing toward Louis. 

“Well, I shouldn’t name names, so I won’t. But there’s been a handful of divas that refused to learn anything, or even show up to their training. And there was one that insisted that my technique was wrong. He tried to teach me _the correct way_ to box when he’d never even been inside a boxing gym before.” 

“No way!” Harry bursts into laughter. Warmth blooms in his chest at the sound. 

“Yeah, He thought he was hot shit. Got all his moves from streaming Rocky Balboa a week before training.” 

They continue sharing gossip about the most horrible actors they’d met. The rest of the drive flies by.

Louis is looking forward to wandering around the shops in the small town. It has been years since he’d spent the summer up here with his family and he realized he missed the cute shops and their welcoming owners. It was so different than the busy hustle of shopping in LA. Harry and Louis take their time browsing through the handful of boutiques and second hand shops that line Main Street. It’s a great change of scenery after being stuck on the same plot of land for the past seven days. 

Louis doesn’t buy anything, but Harry finds a glass pour-over coffee maker and grinder gift set in one of the tiny boutiques. 

“Ooh, a coffee maker! I’m going to get this. It’ll be so good to have some fresh coffee in the mornings again.” He grabs the set and reads the back contents list, making sure it has all the filters and needed parts.

“How does that thing even work?” Louis picks one off the shelf and examines the packaging. 

“You grind the coffee, layer it in the filter paper, and slowly pour hot water over it. Almost like one of those cheap drip machines, but it gives you more control over the extraction.” 

“That is one of the most out-of-place things in this entire town.” Louis chuckles. He can’t imagine his grandfather or uncles ever taking the time to brew coffee in a contraption like that, when a coffee maker could do the work instead.

“Hey, at least I’ll be able to have a decent cup of coffee in the morning.” Harry counters.

“Is my tea not good enough for you?” Louis scoffs.

“Of course it’s fine, but sometimes I just need something a little stiffer to get me going in the morning.”

Louis sputters at the unintended euphemism. He tries to cover it with a cough, but he sees Harry blushing before he shuffles off to check out.

Their last stop of the afternoon is at the General Store. They pile a basket with lots of fresh produce and Harry carefully picks out a bag of coffee beans. He spends a good five minutes turning over each of the three options to read the descriptions and sniffs one of the bags before adding it to the basket.

As they wait in line for their turn to check out, Harry looks through a rack of key chains near the counter.

“Are you going to get one?” Louis asks.

“A keychain?”

“Yeah, as like a souvenir of your trip to the middle of nowhere? A reminder of that time you spent playing gladiator in the foothills?”

“Maybe if I find one I like.” Harry smirks, then returns to rifling through the display. 

There’s an assortment of shapes and designs. Louis sees a lightning bolt, a cartoon dog, an American flag, and so many more. Harry moves one and the light catches on the polished metal. It’s in the shape of an anchor, and Louis immediately thinks of the anchor tattooed on Harry’s wrist. It’s a really cute keychain and Louis suddenly tempted to buy it. 

The desire to buy it strikes him as weird and childish. He can’t put his finger on why he would want something that doesn’t have a practical use. And even stranger, he doesn’t know what it means that he would want something that reminds him of Harry.

His thoughts start to spiral as he realizes, there in the middle of the general store, that he wants to keep a piece of Harry, that he wants Harry. But he doesn’t even know if that is something Harry would want. What if the feeling isn’t mutual? The customer in front of them pays and then it is their turn to check out, so he turns away from the keychain display and walks up to the counter.

\- - -

That night Harry joins him for a movie. It’s the first night since they arrived that Harry hasn’t opted to read alone in his room. Every other night, he’d left the room as soon as Louis had pressed play. The change surprises Louis.

His heartbeat speeds up, nervous to be around Harry so soon after realizing the depth of his attraction. It had taken the whole car ride back from town to calm the fluttery feeling in his stomach. He’d silently stressed over his newly discovered desire to be with Harry. He’d thought up a bunch of questions he couldn’t answer, ran through a few worst-case scenarios, and even made a mental pro-con list. Even after all of the mental exercises, Louis is still only sure of one thing. He wants to be with Harry Styles. Marriage, sex, kissing, the lot. He wants everything with Harry.

He just isn’t sure if Harry feels the same. 

He takes a deep breath and exhales slowly. He will have to take it one step at a time. Tonight, that step is to spend two hours with Harry watching a movie.

He lets Harry choose the movie tonight. Since there is no internet so far from town, Louis has been picking movies off the shelf of VHS tapes in the living room. So far, Louis has watched a few John Wayne movies and even one Jackie Chan movie. It takes a while for him to browse through the shelves. There are nearly 50 tapes in total. Most of the spines are faded from years of sunlight streaming through the window. When he gets through most of the third shelf, Harry exclaims, “Ah ha!” and pulls out _Sleepless in Seattle_. It is one of only a handful of romcoms on the shelf. His grandfather had preferred westerns, but he kept a few “girly” movies, as he would say, around for Louis’ sisters and cousins when they visited. 

“Think I’ll change up the pace, since you have probably only watched action movies the past few nights. And this one is so good.” Harry smirks, waving the tape in front of himself. 

Louis shakes his head and laughs to himself. Why is he not surprised that Harry would pick a romcom? He finds it sort of endearing. He curls into his end of the couch, making himself comfortable. “Well, at least it’s one I haven’t seen before.”

“You haven’t seen it? Ah, but it’s so good!” Harry pops the tape into the player, presses play, and then plops onto the far end of the couch. “You better not fall asleep.” He warns as the opening credits begin to play.

They haven’t even made it to the Empire State building before Harry is asleep. Louis notices that his head is bent at an unnatural angle. His neck is sore just looking at the position. Surely, he is uncomfortable. So, Louis shuts off the movie and he gently wakes Harry. He taps lightly on his shoulder. “Come on,” he whispers as Harry’s eyes flutter open. “Off to bed.”

\- - -

Louis comes out of his room to find Harry already up, making breakfast in the kitchen. He’s wearing a blue tie-dyed shirt with a unicorn on it, and tiny yellow shorts that make his tan legs look a thousand miles long. He’s also got fluffy pink slipper socks on his feet and his curly hair is tied back with a red bandana. The bright combo of clothing is a surprising change from the usual faded white band tees and black shorts that Harry had been wearing for training. But it looks good on him. Louis catches himself staring, so he distracts himself by making tea.

“Morning.” Harry’s voice is low and scratchy from sleep.

“Good morning.” Louis says as he takes two mugs out of the cupboard. 

“I’ve got a mug out for my coffee already, thanks.” Harry says, motioning to the pile of equipment on the counter next to the bag of coffee beans.

“Oh right. You gonna try out that contraption?” Louis puts the extra mug back in the cupboard.

“Yeah. I have something similar at my home, but I don’t usually have time in the morning to use it properly.”

Louis fills the kettle with water and a few minutes later he is sat at the table, enjoying his cuppa. 

Harry plates the finished eggs and toast and brings two heaping plates to the table. He returns to the kitchen to begin the process of making his coffee. And it truly is a process. Louis watches in astonishment at the sheer number of steps Harry has to go through before the coffee finally, slowly, drips out of the funnel. The whole process takes around ten minutes. Louis tries so hard not to laugh at the absurdity of the situation. 

“I could have walked to Starbucks and back by now.” Louis bursts out laughing, unable to contain his mirth.

“It’s worth the effort.” Harry pouts. A few moments later he finally removes the filter and pours the brewed coffee into his mug. “It just tastes so much better than drip coffee.”

“You can take the actor out of LA, but you can’t take the LA out of the actor.” Louis rolls his eyes.

“Hey now!” Harry crosses his arms over his chest, but a smile breaks through his playful pout.

“Let’s dig in, before the food gets cold.” Louis butters his slice of toast and spreads a heap of marmalade across the top. It’s been a long time since he’s had fresh canned marmalade. Harry had found the jars in the General Store and Louis couldn’t turn it down. He takes a bite of the toast and savors the creaminess of the butter mixing with the sweet flavor of the orange. But as he chews, the flavor turns sour. There’s almost a bitter burnt flavor behind the citrus. It is not pleasant. Louis swallows and washes down the bad taste with a gulp of his tea. “Ugh. I think the marmalade has gone off.”

Harry sets down his coffee mug. “But we just bought it yesterday?”

“I know, but it tastes really bad. Did you try it?”

“No, but if it is bad, I don’t want to get sick.”

“Try just a little.” He demands, shoving his piece of toast toward Harry. Harry sighs, but leans forward anyway. He takes a bite, tongue first, and leans back as he chews. 

The fresh taste of orange blooms in Louis’ mouth, as if he is imagining the way it should have tasted. “Tastes fine to me. Actually, more than fine. That’s one of the best marmalades I’ve had.”

“Huh. That’s weird. Maybe I just got a bit of burnt orange or something.” Louis takes a cautious bite of the toast. The bright citrusy flavor is delicious, exactly as he remembered from summers long ago.

\- - -

The rest of their day is filled with training, as per usual. There is still a lot to get done, but they are making progress. Harry seems to have gotten over whatever was blocking him during their first week here and he has been steadily improving. His moves are much more natural and smoother than before. And, he is more confident in his decisions when they battle.

The nicer weather allows them to practice longer during the day, making up for the time they had to wait out the unbearable heat at midday last week. They spend many hours out in the yard battling. By dinner time, they are both knackered and their muscles are sore from the constant use. The spend the night watching yet another romcom of Harry’s choosing before calling it a night.

On Monday, there are early rain showers. Louis improvises the schedule and adds in an indoor yoga session. By afternoon the sky has cleared and they head outside. They review all of the moves Harry has learned so far and add two new ones. Louis is showing him how to fluidly transition from one of the basic stances to a more complicated attacking position when Harry trips. He is too close to the cement patio and catches his foot on the edge. 

“Oops.” Harry says, wincing as he catches his balance. 

“You alright?”

“Yeah, just tripped. Again.”

Practice continues. They try the move again, this time with plenty of room between Harry and the patio. He finally gets the move down on the third try. Louis praises the small accomplishment and then demonstrates the next combo. 

As he moves, there is a strange pull in his knee, like a muscle spasm. When he leans all his weight on the leg, the pain intensifies. Maybe he has been on his legs too much this past week and they’re starting to protest. After all, he’s not as young as he used to be. He pushes through the pain, trying to ignore it. But when Harry attempts the same move, Louis catches him wincing as well. Maybe they are both over doing the training today. He calls it and they both head in for the night.

\- - -

The temperature creeps back up all morning. Summer seems unwilling to make way for autumn. It isn’t nearly as hot as it had been the previous week, but there is still a bit of humidity hanging in the air that makes it feel sweltering. It doesn’t take long for them to strip off their shirts during their afternoon session. Louis catches himself staring a few more times than he cares to admit.

It’s not that he’s never seen him shirtless before. He knows Harry is extremely fit. And all of this time spent training only accentuates that fact. But now Louis is noticing things, like the definition of his abs, length of his legs, the thickness of his thighs. And feeling things too, like the desire to lick his abs, lie between his legs, or be suffocated by his thighs. It’s very distracting.

Louis tries to push down his lust as they continue to battle. There’s adrenaline pumping through his veins as he weaves around the garden, dodging blows and aiming for precise jabs with his sword. Their fights have been getting more intense as Harry’s confidence and talent grows. It’s still not an even match, but there is still a good fight there. It’s a lot of fun. It reminds Louis of his days as an MMA fighter when he would be pitted against the younger fighters during their training to get them more experience with reacting and thinking quickly in the ring. 

Toward the end of the afternoon, they are both worn out. Louis lets his guard down for a brief moment. And it is a huge mistake. 

Harry lunges forward, and raises his sword. Louis miscalculates the trajectory of the sword and isn’t able to block it with his shield. Harry manages to end a fatal blow to his side and gets his first win. 

“Yeah!” Harry roars, raising his sword above his head in victory. “I finally beat you. I beat the undefeated swordmaster! I am the champion!” Harry gloats skipping around, taking a mini victory lap around Louis. 

“Yeah but the score is what? 28 to 1? That’s a pretty terrible record, Styles.” Louis taunts.

“Ahh, are you a sore loser, Lou?” Harry laughs. He bursts out into a boisterous rendition of "We are the Champions". Louis lets him have his moment. It’s so endearing, and a huge smile spreads across Louis’ face, his eyes crinkling at the corners. When he wraps up the song, Louis concedes and congratulates him on his achievement. 

They both head for the showers as soon as training is over. Louis can hear Harry puttering around in the main bath down the hall as he gets ready in the en suite in his room. Louis strips off his sweaty, grass stained shorts and pants, and steps into the lukewarm water. His muscles release all the built up tension from the day and the water cascades down his skin. He grabs a rag and some soap and begins scrubbing at the stubborn dirt stains on his knees and elbows. Sword fighting can be dirty work, especially with the ground soft after the spot of rain earlier that morning. 

Satisfied with his clean skin, he switches to shampooing his hair. He lathers his hair and rinses that out, the suds trailing down his chest and back. His mind wanders to Harry out in the garden. He was so ecstatic when he’d finally beaten Louis Louis was so proud of him. And the way he had gloated and bragged had been kinda hot. 

Louis is getting turned on. His cock is half hard from thinking about Harry strutting around the garden shirtless and claiming victory over Louis. He tries to think of other things, like the training schedule for the following day, but that leads to thoughts of Harry again. 

And then it feels as if there is a hand wrapping around his length. He stares down at himself, confused by the sensation. He’s fully hard now, and it feels as though someone is dragging their fist slowly up his shaft. He shivers. It’s a very faint sensation, Louis is almost convinced that his mind is playing tricks on him. He’s so turned on and needs relief. He knows it will be over fast. He hasn’t gotten himself off at all since coming to the cabin, for fear of making things awkward while in such close quarters with Harry. He wraps his fist around himself and pulls himself off. To keep himself from making sounds, he bites onto his lip. His hand speeds up and he tips his head back in pleasure. He is so close. With one drag of his thumb over the head of his cock, he is coming into his fist, the orgasm rushing through him like lightning. 

He lets go of his softening cock and washes his release down the drain. Then he turns the water off, twisting the handle to cut off the stream. Through the wall he hears a moan. Louis blushes. Harry must have been getting off in the shower at the same time as he was. Maybe he wasn’t the only one turned on by their little battle. He grabs a towel and dries off and vows not to mention any of that to Harry.

\- - -

After Harry’s success yesterday, Louis gives them extra time off around lunch. Harry wanders off immediately once he dries the last of their lunch dishes. Louis takes the free time to make a few phone calls. There’s barely enough service for the calls to go through, but it is possible if he stands on the edge of the porch facing left and doesn’t move at all once the call connects. It really puts his LA life into perspective, a reminder of how convenient everything has become.

Once he finishes up his calls, he sits on the porch reading a book that he’d found in the lounge. It smells a bit musty and the glue in the spine cracks as he opens it, but its pages remain intact. It’s a gorgeous afternoon, likely one of the last perfect days before the cold bite of autumn takes over. 

He’s a couple of chapters in when he begins to notice the pain. Every time he turns a page, the fingers on his right hand feel raw. It’s as if they’d been burned recently. He inspects his fingertips closely. There’s no visible damage or redness to the pads. He presses the thumb and index finger together and winces as a sharp pain shoots through the fingertips. He repeats this with the other fingers on his right hand. The first two fingers and his thumb seem to have it the worst. The ring and pinky finger don’t seem affected at all. When he isn’t touching the pads there is a constant dull ache. It’s barely noticeable, but still concerning.

Louis racks his brain for what could cause this. It might be poison oak. He could have brushed up against a vine while outside. But it’s more of a soreness than an itchiness. Maybe it was the old book. What if there was some weird strain of book mold growing and in the pages that he released when he’d started to read. 

It worries Louis, especially because he can’t figure out why it’s painful at all. He thinks of a hundred possible causes, too distracted by what-ifs to return to the pages of his book. 

The pain begins to spread over to the left hand too. Louis is starting to panic. 

He needs to find Harry, in case it is some weird allergic reaction. A quick scan of the garden fails to turn up Harry. He rushes across the garden, doing one last sweep of the land. When he reaches the far edge, he stops to catch his breath. 

He stands there, hands on his hips, surveying the land in front of the cabin, with no sign of Harry. But then he catches a melody. At first he doesn’t believe his ears. He turns toward the forest and listens harder. There is music coming from the forest! He can hear a guitar, the chords strumming intermittently. It’s so out of place and strange to hear actual music where there should be nothing but birdsong. The oddness of it puzzles Louis and piques his curiosity. And that curiosity is strong enough to make him forget the reason he’d been searching for Harry in the first place.

He follows the melody, the sound growing louder with each step toward the forest. He reaches the opening in the fence. He gives a nervous glance toward the faded red sign in the bushes as he passes. The guitar melody changes to something slower, but it isn’t a song Louis recognizes. And then he catches the sound of a voice accompanying the guitar. It’s not loud enough to make out the words, but there is a low voice singing along. 

It’s Harry. He has a beautiful voice, deep and harmonic and carries the tune. Louis doesn’t recognize the first song, but it is very lovely. He didn’t even know Harry could sing. He is mesmerized by how good Harry is at singing, although the guitar could use a bit of practice. 

He walks carefully, not wanting to startle Harry. He’s afraid that if Harry sees him, he might will stop playing. It’s selfish of Louis, really, to intrude on a private moment. But he doesn’t want to do anything to stop Harry’s beautiful singing.

He gets close enough to see through the trees and then crouches behind a short bush. Harry is sat on a log with the guitar in his lap. Louis recognizes it from the campfires his uncles used to do with all of the cousins many summers ago. It must have been tucked away in a closet. 

Harry plays a few more bars and then ends the song. The last notes fade softly into the forest. He tunes the guitar a bit and strums another chord. Louis doesn’t recognize the next song until Harry joins in with the lyrics. It’s not a song Louis has ever heard acoustic before, but it is a perfect balance of soft and compelling. It is amazing. He is lost in the song, enraptured by Harry’s voice and the lyrics as he sings "Take On Me".

_ We're talking away_  
_I don't know what_  
_I'm to say I'll say it anyway_  
_Today's another day to find you_  
_Shying away_  
_I'll be coming for your love, okay?_

_ So needless to say_  
_Of odds and ends_  
_But I'll be stumbling away_  
_Slowly learning that life is OK._  
_Say after me,_  
_"It's no better to be safe than sorry."_

A small brown bird dashes in front of Harry and over to the tree in front of Louis. Harry follows the movement with eyes. Louis’ cover is blown as their eyes meet and Harry stumbles over the chorus of the song. He recovers quickly, continuing to play. Louis is embarrassed at being caught creeping around, but he takes the fact that Harry doesn’t stop as an invitation to join him. Louis sits on the log a few feet from Harry and listens to the rest of the song.

His voice grows more powerful and steady for the final chorus and he belts out the final high notes perfectly every time. Harry is quiet when he finishes, muting the strings by holding his palm over the sound hole. 

“That was really good.” Louis congratulate, not sure if he should clap or apologize for being creepy. Louis glances at him, curious if he will start another song. 

A meek smile curls Harry’s lips. “Thanks, I forgot how good it feels to play.”

“You don’t play when you’re back at home?” 

“No, I haven’t played in years.” Harry says wryly. The words settle around them. Louis is not sure how to respond. Harry’s tone confuses him. Eventually, Harry sets the guitar down in his lap. Louis stays quiet, watching as Harry picks at the frayed strap in his hands.

“When I was sixteen, I auditioned for _Night Changes_. And I got the part. After that, my career took off. I didn’t have much time for hobbies, between acting jobs and all the bullshit that comes with it.

“I do love acting, don’t get me wrong. But there are some parts that I can’t stand. Like, I feel so restricted. Everyone sees me as the characters I’ve played. Even when I’m not on screen, there is always someone deciding what I can do, or say, or wear. Who I can spend time with. But if I push back at all the parts that I hate, I won’t have a career at all.” 

Harry doesn’t say anything for a moment. Then he sighs. “But to be honest, I don’t know if I would have been better off the other way either.”

“What do you mean?” Louis glances at Harry, puzzled look on his face.

“The music industry isn’t any different than the film industry.” 

Louis considers his next words carefully. He could agree and let the comment go, or he could offer some advice, having been in a similar situation. In the end, he decides to tell Harry his story. 

“I was an MMA fighter. One of the best. I worked my ass off to get to the top. I started training at thirteen and worked my way up the ranks. All of the analysts said I had a very promising career ahead of me. They predicted I would be the youngest fighter ever to be signed to the UFC, at just twenty years old. But just a few months before my twentieth birthday, I was injured during a training session. I was so close to going pro. And then I wasn’t. 

“I could have recovered and gotten back in the ring. It’s what was expected. The analysts wagered if I got back in the ring soon enough, I could still get signed by the time I was twenty-two. But the doctors told me I had a very high risk of reinjury. And I was burnt out and fed up with the realities of the MMA world. So I decided to let go of my dream of going pro.”

Harry seems to consider Louis’ words. Then he says, “I think I’m burnt out too. But I would get so much hate if I just walked away from it all.” 

“My decision to stop fighting wasn’t easy, and I second-guessed myself all the time. It didn’t help that fans would tweet that I was a coward, and worse, for stepping away from the sport. But I learned that there will always be people that hate me for giving up my career, and even if I hadn’t given up my career, they would probably hate that I’m gay. There will always be people looking for reasons to hate you. In the end, you have to make the decision for yourself, not for the tabloids and tweets.” 

Louis’ advice sits heavy in the air between them. Then Harry turns the conversation to trolls on Twitter. He tells Louis a story about how he’d once been rumored to play a character in The Little Mermaid and everyone started making memes about him and how he would make the perfect Disney princess. The story lightens the mood considerably and they spend the rest of the afternoon laughing and talking out in the forest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here](https://open.spotify.com/track/7htt7UuxHL5wneOcMWJP5E?si=auZEAwa-RdO35FeKZk6O0A) is the acoustic version of "Take on Me" that inspired the guitar scene.


	7. Chapter 7

“Are you ready for something new?” Louis asks as they are eating their lunch.

“Again? I thought we were just about done learning new moves.” Harry pouts, unsure of what’s to come.

“No, not new sword stuff. You’ve been doing great with the swords. This is something entirely new,” Louis smirks. “We have just under two weeks left of training so I thought it would be a good time to work on some of the other skills that you’ll need before we start filming.” Harry tries to recall the other skills Louis had listed out on one of the schedules. He doesn’t like where this conversation seems to be headed.

“I think you’re ready for some hand-to-hand combat training.”

It takes everything in Harry not to groan out loud at those words. “Alright.”

The have an hour off after lunch. Harry chooses to spend the break in his room, needing the full hour to prepare himself for what’s to come.

Of all the days Louis could have picked to start this segment of their training, it had to be the day after their conversation in the forest. The day after Louis had come out.

It had been a small statement in the conversation, nothing with a ton of build up or fanfare. Harry had not commented on it at all. But that one statement brought up a new lot of anxiety. It was easy enough to ignore this crush when he’d not known for certain - he was able to convince himself that Louis wouldn’t be interested. But now he knows, and it is possible that his feelings could be returned. It adds a whole new dimension to this crush that Harry has been futilely attempting to contain. 

And what’s more, Harry hadn’t come out to Louis yesterday, which he sort of regrets. He has made vague references to the closet he is stuck in and his desire to come out, but he hadn’t thought to say the words outright, to confirm that he was also gay, like Louis. He hates that his natural instinct is to not speak about his own identity. Louis had said the words with a quiet confidence, so sure of his himself and capable of freely sharing it with others. Harry has never known that feeling. He learned quickly that it is far easier to say nothing than to risk breaking that term of his contract.

It’s too late to come out now. They aren’t in the forest anymore. They aren’t having a heart-to-heart with advice sharing and kind words. He’d missed his chance to slip a subtle coming out into the natural flow of conversation. They are at work and they are about to train. He can’t just blurt out “I’m gay!” with no context and then continue on with training. The unspoken words are trapped, fluttering in his mind like a bird in a cage. 

And now he is about to get out there for a training session that will undoubtedly feature wrestling, and touching, his very fit trainer. Harry is panicking. He paces his room. There is no way this is going to end well. 

Harry comes out of his room just as the old cuckoo clock on the wall announces the hour. Louis leads them to the back garden, where they always do their training. Harry stands with his hands clasped behind his back, wringing his hands nervously as he waits for Louis to tell him where to go. 

As soon as they finish some warm up stretches, Louis gives a brief intro to what he has planned.. He stands in front of Harry with his hand on his hip, commanding Harry’s attention as he talks. “This part of training shouldn’t take long. There’s only one scene in the movie where you will be fighting without your sword. That scene where Magnus attacks Antonius in his home.”

“Yeah, I remember that scene.”

“The producers said they want the fight to look polished, since Antonius and Magnus are both trained gladiators. There will be some kicks and punches thrown, but there will also be a lot of grappling and submission holds, where Magnus will be preventing Antonius from getting to his weapons. Antonius will need to escape or reverse these holds to get away from Magnus.”

Harry nods along to Louis’ explanation. It matches closely to what he’d been picturing while reading the script.

“You already do some boxing and from what I’ve seen, your technique is solid, so we can skip through most of the foundations. We’ll start with some of the other moves that I’ll use when we get to the choreography for the fight. And then I’ll show you how we can put it all together for the scene. Sound good?”

“Sure.” Harry is anything but sure. Nothing about Louis showing him grappling and submission holds sounds good to Harry right now. Only one thing sounds good, a cold shower to calm down. 

“First, let’s work on the sprawl. It’s basically a burpee to avoid a takedown. You’re going to drop your hands to the ground and send your legs back and hips down. The push off the ground and explode back up. Watch.” Louis demonstrates slowly talking through each motion. He gracefully shifts his weight, dropping his palms to the ground. His legs kick out wide behind him and thrusts his hips toward the earth. His arms flex as he pushes off the ground to jump up. He returns to a neutral stance, feet shoulder width apart and fists up near his face. 

Louis does a few more slow sprawls and then speeds up for the last three, completing the set at a rapid pace. An unbidden image of Louis sprawled out face down on a bed flashes in Harry’s mind. Harry winces and tries to clear his thoughts. Now is not the time to get turned on. He will not be distracted during training. He is a professional.

Louis pops up one last time. “Your turn.”

Harry takes naturally to the sprawl, having done his fair share of burpees in past gym sessions with not-so-nice personal trainers. The physical exertion is luckily enough to keep him from imagining other not-safe-for-work visions. 

The other demonstrations go similarly. Louis explains the move as he demonstrates, going slow enough that Harry can follow along. Then Harry attempts the move. Harry only catches himself staring at Louis’ arms and back instead of watching the demonstration a few times. Overall, it goes better than Harry expects.

By the time the get to takedowns, the adrenaline of a demanding physical work out has taken over from Harry’s anxiety about the required proximity to Louis for these moves. He is excited to be learning something new and it helps that Louis is enjoying the training as much as he is.

Harry knows that Louis is a great trainer, but there’s something different about today’s lesson. There’s a spark in his eyes, a lighter jump in his step, a hotter fire in his veins. It’s like he’s back in the MMA ring. This is clearly Louis’ area of expertise. He is in his element, instructing Harry on how to be taken down without injuring himself and how to escape from holds quickly.

The afternoon flies by. The only move they have left to practice is the most important part of the scene, where Magnus has taken Antonius down, is mounted on top and is choking him. Per the script, Antonius will flip Magnus’s body to the side to escape the hold. Then he’ll scramble away and reach for the dagger next to his bed. 

“This is a common self-defense move.” Louis says. He lies down on the grass. “Straddle my hips and pretend to choke me.”

Harry’s eyes widen and he blinks in disbelief. He’s made it through the sprawls and the grappling and the takedowns. But that command sends all of his blood south. He can’t handle the image of Louis laid out before him while giving a command to be choked.

“C’mon Magnus,” Louis jokes when Harry doesn’t move.

“Um, okay.” Harry carefully straddles Louis, knees on either side of his chest and hips hovering above his waist. He is cautious not to put any weight on Louis. He reaches up and places his hand on Louis’ neck without any pressure.

“Lean into it. Remember, you have to make the hold look believable. The camera angle won’t compensate for faked holds like it can with fake punches. 

Harry takes a steadying breath and tries to clear his mind. He leans into the hold, dropping his hips and trapping Louis between his knees.

“You’re going to escape from this position by throwing Magnus off to the side. To do that, you’re going to grab the right arm.” Louis wraps his hand tightly around Harry’s wrist and tricep. “Move your left leg to the outside of his right leg.” Louis bends both legs at the knee and shifts his left leg to the side around Harry’s. “Use your hips to thrust the opponent over and roll them to your left.” Louis shifts his hips up and over rolling them softly to the side. Louis pushes out from the tangle of limbs and hops up. “Now you try.”

Harry, still on the ground, turns to lie on his back and braces himself. Goosebump freckle his arms despite the warm air. Louis kneels down next to him. Harry suddenly realises that he is half hard.

Before he can adjust himself, or call this whole thing off and hide in his room, Louis swings a leg over Harry’s middle and settles firmly on his lower belly. He presses his hand to Harry’s throat and Harry breath catches. A sudden rush of desire spikes in his blood. He’s just strong enough to restrain the whimper that dares to escape. Now is such an unfortunate time to discover that he has a thing for choking. Although, it’s more to do with the man on top of him that what he is doing that has Harry all out of sorts.

“Alright!” Louis’ voice brings his mind back into focus. “Get out of this hold.” Louis squeezes his knees firmly into Harry’s side for emphasis.

Harry unsurely puts his hands around Louis’ arms and moves his legs into position. When he pauses, Louis gives him a small nod, signaling that he can continue. Harry steels himself for the next part. He thrusts his hips over to flip Louis, but misjudges his momentum and continues rolling, landing on top of Louis.

“That was good, H. But a little less power this time. Let’s try again.” It takes five more attempts before Harry finally get the escape perfected.

“One more time, then we can call it a night.”

Harry goes through the motions, more sure of himself this time. His hands, then his legs, then his hips. Louis pretends to struggle a bit more than he did in other attempts but Harry still manages to roll Louis off of him in one fluid maneuver. With all of Louis’ struggling, Harry lands differently this time, his groin pressing firm into the top of Louis’ thigh. A quiet moan slips past him, but he quickly covers it with a cough.

Harry’s cheeks flame as he rushes to pull himself off of Louis. There’s no way Louis didn’t feel his hard-on. He stumbles to his feet and then tries to brush off the incident as if it hadn’t happened.

“Uhh, good training. I’m gonna, umm, head in for a shower. See you at dinner.” Harry rushes off, not waiting for a response.


	8. Chapter 8

With the way Harry had rushed off at the end of their training, Louis is not expecting him to come out of his room for dinner. But after showering and getting dressed, Louis traipses into the kitchen and finds Harry standing over the stove. 

Louis had caught on that Harry was sporting a semi during their training. He wasn’t immune to a fit guy straddling him repeatedly either. He had been turned on by the end of their session, too. But he senses that Harry is embarrassed by the situation, so he decides to keep his jokes to himself. 

Dinner is a quiet affair. They eat in relative silence. The television is on, set to the only station that comes in clear through the antenna. Some reruns of an old sitcom play, filling the cabin with murmured lines and too-loud laugh tracks. After the dinner dishes are cleared away, they agree to put on another John Wayne movie from the shelf of VHS tapes. They watch the movie in a fog of awkward tension. Harry’s eyes never leave the screen. Only when the end credits roll does he glance over and whisper good night to Louis before heading to his room. 

Louis pushes himself off of the couch cushion, legs stiff after two hours of inactivity. He takes his time rewinding the tape, the whir of the machine hypnotic. When the rewind stops with a loud click, it startles Louis. He tucks the tape back into the sleeve and puts it back on the shelf. He heads for his own bedroom, flicking off the lights as he goes. 

It takes him a bit to ready himself for bed. Setting an alarm, brushing his teeth, stripping off his clothes. But soon he crawls between the cool sheets and lets his body sink into the mattress. He lies there, staring at the shadows on the ceiling, but sleep doesn’t come easy. His mind is still spinning from the image of Harry underneath him, and from the feeling of Harry straddling him. He curses and attempts to push the thoughts from his mind. He rolls onto his stomach, tucking his arms under the pillow. He closes his eyes and settles into the position, but sleep still does not come. 

Louis just wants to sleep, exhausted from a day of training and with an early alarm set for the next morning. But his body doesn’t seem to get the message. It’s difficult to fall asleep with his cock fattening against his thigh where it’s trapped between the mattress. He tries to ignore it.

His hard-on doesn’t flag. Desire thrums through his veins and he’s fully hard now. He debates the pros and cons of wanking just so that he can go to sleep. As he lies there, thinking of ways he could get himself off quickly, he imagines a touch tracing up the length of his cock. The unexpected feeling sends shivers up his spine. And then a hand wraps around him, dragging up and down his shaft. Louis gasps. He did not imagine that. It’s the same phantom feelings as that night in the shower. Louis has no idea what’s happening, but he’s so hard and it feels good. Maybe his body is rejecting his recent lack of orgasms by creating its own.

He doesn’t touch himself but Louis focuses in on the feeling of the phantom hand. He’d been too close last time to pay much attention. But as he lies in bed, he’s able to follow the sensations. The invisible hand drags dryly over his cock. He moans when it twists up his shaft. And then it disappears. Louis’ brow creases.

His nipples begin to tingle. They harden into tight buds, sensitive where they rub against the bedsheets. He’s not usually one for nipple play, but it doesn’t feel bad. Suddenly a sharp pain shoots through his right nipple, as if someone pinched it. Louis bites his fist to muffle a moan.

The phantom feeling returns to his cock. It feels smoother and faster than before, dragging as if aided by lube. Louis is lost to the strange feelings. He has been on edge for so long that he doesn’t give a second thought to his orgasm is being worked out of him by some unknown force. He is into it, whatever it is. And it’s way better than the rushed hand job he was going to settle for anyway. So he takes whatever sensations his body is feeling and accepts the teasing, sensuous phantom hands that are playing over his body so well.

The invisible hand slides tightly over his heated skin at a steady pace. Louis rocks his hips into the mattress with the motion. The grip softens and slows and then disappears again. Louis groans into the pillow. Louis hates being teased.

The phantom feeling returns, this time as though a single fingertip is drawing patterns up and down his length. The fingertip dips down, tracing around his balls and across his perineum. He shivers and pushes his hips up toward the fleeting feeling. The finger circles back up the same path, up the length of his cock. If it were a real hand, it’d trace through the precome that’s likely already smeared at the tip. 

All of the sensations are so wildly different from how Louis would normally get himself off. Where he would be quick and rough, the invisible fingers are methodical and light. Where he would rush to the finish, the hand continues to tease the orgasm from him. It’s maddening. And so, so good.

The fingers trace back down, more urgent this time. Down his cock, around his balls, across his perineum. Further this time. They pass over his hole. One fingertip presses lightly at the rim. Louis squirms at the unexpected touch. It’s been a long time since he has had sex or even properly gotten himself off with more than just hand jobs. The feeling of the phantom fingers linger around his hole, tracing circles around the tight muscle. One tip presses inside. Louis moans into the pillow and thrusts his hips back. He reaches behind himself, feeling his opening. It’s dry and empty. Yet, he definitely feels the width of a finger stretching him. He drops his own hand to the mattress and grips at the bedsheets as the phantom finger glides in and out. A second finger joins the first. He clenches the fistful of bedsheets as the fingers just barely graze his prostate. 

The fingers speed up, aiming directly for the prostate now. He thrusts back into the invisible fingers then rocks his hips into the mattress, giving much needed friction to his aching cock. He lifts his hips, adjusting the angle and sees stars when the next thrust lands perfectly. He reaches a hand under himself. He can’t wait any longer. A fire has built up in his abdomen. He needs release. The sweet torture of the edging and the delicious drag of the fingers is nearly enough to drag him over the edge. With just a few extra twists of his own hand, he spills into his open palm.

He flips onto his back, completely spent from the intense phantom orgasm situation. He fumbles around with his clean hand for the pair of dirty pants he’d kicked off near the bed. He wipes the come from his hand. Clean enough, he tosses the pants to the floor and flips onto his stomach. He falls asleep fast, sated and knackered from the surreal experience.

\- - -

Louis’ alarm blares at 6:15, just as Louis had set it the night before. It is way too early. He groans and rolls across the bed, legs tangled in the sheets. He knocks his phone off the nightstand while trying to turn off the alarm. He finally gets it shut off and peels himself out of bed. 

Clothes scatter the floor around him, so he begins tidying up searching for a halfway clean shirt to wear to breakfast. He picks up the pair of pants near the bed. The one side is smeared in dried come. Last night rushes back to Louis. He plops down on the edge of the mattress, his half-asleep brain sifting through the memories of the night before. He is skeptical, but it’s hard not to believe when the evidence is right there, smeared into the fabric of the pants in his hand. 

Was it all just a fever dream, fueled by his exhaustion and pent up desire? Or was there something more to this strange situation? Louis considers what he remembers of the two instances. They’d both started so similar, with a teasing, nonexistent hand pulling him off. But both times had ended so different. Last night was sensual, intense, and so, so good. The time before had been good, too, but more rushed and purposeful. Almost as if the hands knew of Louis’ carnal need for a quick release. And then there had been the moan. Harry’s moan. Louis had all but forgotten that he’d overheard Harry’s moan through the adjacent bathroom wall that first time. Louis’ cheeks heat at the recollection that Harry and he had gotten off at the same time, just two tiled walls and some old pipes between them. 

Louis mouth goes dry. What if this has something to do with Harry? 

Louis tries to deny that thought, but all of his arguments fall short. Half-formed theories circle through his mind and they all lead directly back to Harry. 

A fragment of an idea edges to the forefront. The memory of Harry sat on the log, strumming his guitar and singing into the forest. Louis had been so shocked to discover that Harry could sing and play guitar that he forgot about his sore fingers, the reason he’d gone looking for Harry in the first place. The dull ache in his fingers was a huge mystery that Louis had completely forgotten about when their conversation flowed to more serious topics. But know that he pulls at the edges of the memory, forcing himself to remember the chain of events, he remembers the ache started gradually, getting sore, but not getting worse. Thinking about it now, it is not unlike the pain from a new activity. Like the time Louis went rock climbing and climbed until his fingers were raw and blistered over. 

Louis’ eyes widen and he covers his mouth to restrain a shriek. Was it possible that Harry’s fingers were rubbed raw from the guitar strings after not playing for so long? And why would Louis feel his pain? 

He digs through the past two weeks, looking for other strange occurrences that he’d brushed off at the moment. There was that weird breakfast, the first after buying a jar of marmalade at the general store. His first taste of it had tasted bitter like coffee, but that was impossible. He’d explained it away as a bit of burnt orange mixed into the batch. But had he been tasting Harry’s coffee? Was that possible? It didn’t seem so unlikely now. 

He tries to recall other instances where food had tasted off, but their diets have been so similar. They always cook a meal to share and eat together. It’s strange to think that he might be sensing what Harry is tasting but hasn’t noticed because they’ve been eating the same foods at the same time. 

None of this makes sense. There is no reasonable explanation for sharing senses with another person. It’s almost like a curse from a children’s book. Louis stiffens. 

That’s it! A curse! 

He recalls the myths he’d learned his first summer at the cabin. On one of the hottest days of the year, his aunt had driven all the cousins into town to swim at the community pool. There, they’d met some local kids that were quick to warn the Louis, his siblings, and his cousins of the dangerous myths and legends of the mountains. They’d told elaborate tales of witches that cursed people that entered their forests and goblins that would eat children that wandered off paths. 

Louis had been old enough at the time to see the myths for what they were: stories meant to scare the younger children for laughs. But what if there was some truth behind all the myths?

Louis paces the room, recounting the facts of the situation. With all of the strange instances that Louis can remember, magic would be as good a guess as any as to what is going on. 

Among all the uncertainty of this situation, there is only one thing Louis is sure of. He will have to tell Harry. Eventually. He doesn’t have a clue how he would broach the topic of “Hey, I can feel everything -- _everything_ \-- you do, but have no idea why. And by the way, I got off to you fingering yourself, because hey, I could feel that too!” He doesn’t think it is necessary to tell Harry until he knows what is going on and how to fix it. 

Louis decides, amongst all his pacing and thinking, that he won’t be able to figure this out without a bit of outside help. So he makes a plan to go to the library for a bit of research during his trip into town on Saturday. It will help to have some books and the internet to find some answers. He’ll just have to go into town without Harry. It would be too difficult to explain his sudden urge to google witchcraft and curses without sounding like he’s gone crazy. 

With a semi-solid plan in place, Louis feels slightly better. He only needs to get through one more day of practice until he can get some answers.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: There is one small scene with a minor injury featuring a description of blood in this chapter.

Louis is avoiding Harry. Or at least that is the conclusion that Harry has come to. 

Louis was more fidgety than usual during Friday’s training sessions. Then he skipped dinner. He claimed that he had gotten too much sun and wasn’t feeling well. He didn’t come out of his room the whole night. If Harry had to guess, he’d say the situation at the end of Thursday’s practice had made Louis uncomfortable. If this theory is true, it’s going to be a long final week at the cabin.

Louis is still avoiding him this morning, but he has at least left his room. Harry finds Louis standing at the sink with sudsy water is up to his elbows as he washes his breakfast dishes. 

“Good morning,” Harry says.

“Morning.” Louis doesn’t look up from the pan he is scrubbing.

“Are these for me?” Harry asks, pointing to the plate of scrambled eggs on the counter. He reaches up into the cupboard and pulls out a mug for his coffee.

“Yep.” Louis replies.

“Thanks.” 

“Um hmm.”

It’s silent as Harry brews his cup of coffee and Louis finishes washing the dishes. It’s unnerving to be around a quiet version of Louis. Harry is tempted to start up the conversation a few times, but can’t land on a topic that might break the tension in the room. When his coffee has finally dripped through the filter, he pours his mug. 

Harry grabs the plate and sits at the table. He digs in. At least the eggs are still warm and the coffee is flowing, even if the conversation is not.

Louis drains the sink and grabs a towel to begin drying the dishes.

“So, are we going into town this afternoon?” Harry asks after washing down a bite of egg with a sip of coffee.

A look of disgust scrunches Louis’ face. It’s barely perceptible but Harry had been watching for his response closely. If Louis is only going to give one-word responses, Harry is going to need to look harder for the full answer. He needs to figure out what has caused the sudden rift between them somehow. Harry tugs at his bottom lip. 

Louis dries his hands, sets the towel on the counter, and adjusts his fringe. He begins putting dishes away as he answers. “Oh, umm, I had some personal errands, and like, stuff. It’s boring, really. You can, uh, tag along if you want, but it might take all day.”

Harry doesn't have to look hard to know that Louis was only offering for Harry to come along as a courtesy. The uncharacteristic stammering, unsure answer, and the nervous adjustment of his fringe tells him loud and clear. Harry has been looking forward to getting into town, an escape for a few hours from this small plot of land. But he can read between the lines clear enough to see how uncomfortable Louis is and he understands the desire to spend the day alone. So Harry gives in without putting up a fight. “Oh, that’s alright. I think I’ll just hang around here. Relax for a bit.”

“Okay. I’m actually gonna head out now. Um, yeah. I’ll be back later. I don’t know how long I’ll be, but I’ll be back for dinner.” Harry nods in understanding and Louis exits the kitchen. He returns fully dressed and with his shoes on. With a short goodbye, he is gone. 

The cabin is eerily quiet with only Harry to fill the small space. He passes some time restlessly tidying up the living room, kitchen, and his room. He even throws a load of laundry in the wash. He runs out of chores to occupy his time after only an hour. He considers running lines, but it is supposed to be his day off. If he’s learned anything during his time out at this cabin, it’s that he needs more separation between his work and his personal time. He also considers reading a book. He stares at the dozens of books lining the shelves of the living room, but none of the various titles call out to him. He’s too restless to focus on a story anyway.

He wanders back into his room and remembers the guitar tucked away in the closet. He’d been too busy with training to pick it back up after that day in the forest, but he had a lot of fun plucking at the chords he could remember and singing some of his favorite songs. 

He grabs the guitar and heads out of his room. As he passes his suitcase, the worn brown cover of his notebook poking out under a pair of shorts catches his eye. The notebook is mostly filled with acting notes, character development exercises, and facts about gladiators from his preparation for this upcoming role. But once upon a time, he’d had a similar notebook filled with lyrics and poems and doodles. All the songs a younger version of himself thought might be shared with the world one day are locked in a chest in his LA home. 

If it had been a while since he’d played guitar, it had been even longer since he’d put pen to paper to write his own lyrics. But he is feeling inspired. He is rusty, hardly getting anything out of the first two pages. He spends more time doodling around the pages while brainstorming ideas than he does writing. But eventually he stumbles across a rhythm, finds a few words to mirror the cadence, and soon he’s off. He loses himself in the lines of the page. He has a few verses and the start of a melody after only two hours of writing. 

It’s late afternoon. his fingers are sore from playing the guitar again. There are ten pages of scribbled song bites and potential lyrics. He’s got a strong start on at least two songs. He flips through the pages, rereading the lines. He’s impressed with his work. He had not realized just how much he missed this hobby until he brought it back. 

As he scans the pages one last time, he notices that all of the rushed doodles filling the margins follow a central theme. Birds, arrows, card suits, tiny tea cups. They are mostly designs that reflect the tattoos smattered across Louis’ arms. maybe he’s taken more inspiration from Louis than he’d care to admit, but at least he has a few good lyrics out of the deal. 

He tucks the notebook back into his suitcase and stores the beat up guitar in the back of the closet. Even if nothing comes from this writing session, he feels like he has made something worthwhile. 

He starts cooking their dinner, just as he hears tires crunching the gravel up the driveway. Louis clangs the front door open, throws his keys onto the kitchen table and drops two grocery bags onto the counter. He begins wordlessly putting the assortment of groceries in the fridge and then disappears into his room until dinner. He didn’t even say hello.

Harry sighs. He stacks two plates, two cups, and some silverware onto a pile and balances it all as he carries the stack to the table. He clears the table so he can set it, shuffling a few sheets of paper into a neat stack, and grabbing Louis’ keys to toss them into the bowl on the counter. A new metal keychain glints as he drops the keys into the bowl. It stands out amongst the other assortment of keys as the only decorative element. It’s an anchor. Harry recognizes it from the general store in town, the rack of keychains he’d browsed through to waste time as they stood in line. He’d been looking at it and Louis had asked if he planned to get a souvenir to remember their training. That’s weird. Did Louis want to remember the month he spent with Harry? He leaves the keys in the bowl and then continues setting the table while he ponders the significance of the charm. Maybe it means something. Or maybe it’s just a keychain.

\- - -

The next day, Louis strides down the hallway carrying a long cardboard box in his arms. “I’ve got a surprise for today’s training. Let’s go out to the garden.”  
His boisterous entrance is a stark contrast to the silent avoidance of the previous days. The force of the change nearly gives him whiplash. Harry has no idea what to expect, but he is curious to see what is in the box.

Harry leans over Louis’ shoulder, excited to see what he has brought. Louis opens the end flaps of the box and pulls out something rolled in tons of bubble wrap. “I picked these up at the post office yesterday.”

Louis is more willing to talk than he had been the past two days. But he there is still a nervous energy about him that wasn’t there a week ago. He tucks his fringe back from his face more than usual, clasping his hands and twiddling his thumbs when he talks, and constantly taps his foot when he is sitting. Harry has noticed all of these tells over the past few days, now that he is paying closer attention to him. He doesn’t know what to make of Louis’ strange behavior.

Harry watches Louis unwrap layers of bubble wrap, revealing two sheathed swords. Harry picks up the new gladius and feels the weight of it in his hand. He withdraws the blade from the leather sheath. It’s nearly identical in size to the plastic mock ups that they have been using, but this one features a wood hilt and a metal blade. The blade is wide and symmetrical. Where there should be a sharp tip, it has been rounded off into a blunt curve. The blade glints in the sunlight as Harry rocks the sword back and forth in his hand, examining every aspect of the new weapon.

“It’s beautiful,” Harry says.

“It’s not real, and the edges are blunted to it shouldn’t cut anyone, but this is the prop sword you’ll be using in the movie. I had Jenny, the props designer, send these over so you could get used to the weight. They agreed as long as we don’t lose or break them before filming starts.”

“This is really cool. Makes this whole thing all feel a bit more real.”

“I spoke to Liam while I was in town.” Louis says as he starts packing the bubble wrap inside the now empty box. Louis’ fidgety energy is suppressed by a more serious behavior as he switches into work mode. 

“Liam called you, but not me?” Harry asks, hurt that his own agent hasn’t called him. Though, come to think of it, he wouldn’t really know if he hand called. He has no service out here. He hasn’t even bothered to turn his phone on since he got to the cabin, so he can’t be upset.

“No, I called Liam. Just to check in. He says hi, by the way. Anyway, he says that _Redemption in Rome_ filming is on track to start the second week of October, but that the pre-production is lagging behind so the producers are rearranging some of the deadlines to keep everything on schedule. They’re flying out someone from Costumes for a fitting, since they want all the costumes done before we get back to LA. Liam scheduled the fitting for Tuesday, I hope you don’t mind.”

“Let me check with my trainer, he tends to run a tight ship. Louis, will that work with your schedule?” Harry giggles at his attempted humor.

“You know, I could be more controlling if that’s what you wanted.” Louis winks. Harry barks out a laugh that echoes off the trees and slaps a hand over his mouth. He was not expecting that response from Louis.

After a few more updates from Louis, they finally get down to training. They spar for the whole afternoon. Louis begins to work on some of the specific choreography, coaching Harry on when to combine moves for the dramatization of the battle.

It’s more thrilling to battle with Louis with the new metal swords. Where before there would be dull thuds of plastic, the metal clangs on impact. The colliding blades reverberate against the trees and the metal zings as the two blades slide against each other. The realness of these swords intensifies everything.

Harry’s arms begin to ache from the exertion sooner than usual due to the added weight of the new sword. He pushes through the soreness, continuing to spar with Louis as the afternoon winds down. Louis bounces and flits through the garden like a fox frolicking in a meadow. Despite the numerous days spent following Louis in this garden, he’s having a difficult time keeping up with his high levels of energy today.

Harry hops from foot to foot, constantly moving as he calculates his next attack. Before he can make a move, Louis pushes off with his back leg and springs forward, clearing a huge distance in a single leap. Harry brings up his shield to block the strike. The power of Louis’ sword colliding with the shield sends Harry back, as he’d forgotten to to brace his legs to maintain his balance. He topples back and falls on his arse.

He scrambles to his feet, then darts backwards before Louis can get to him. Louis is circling him like prey. Then Harry spots a weakness. He plans his attack. He rushes left, coming around on Louis’ left side. But Harry forgets to consider his surroundings. His foot catches on a raised cement block of the patio. He tumbles forward. He lands hard. His knee scrapes against the cement and his palms slam into the grass in front of him. He is sprawled out on the lawn before he knows what happened.

“Ow! Damn! Are you okay?” Louis rushes over to Harry. Harry rolls over onto his back. Louis kneels down at his side.

“Yeah, think I’m okay.” He moves to sit up, pressing into the ground for leverage. Louis places a gentle palm on Harry’s shoulder to help him sit up. He grimaces as he stretches out his leg. He takes stock of himself. He is fine, other than the scraped knee. Tiny droplets of blood pool around the angry scrape covering most of his kneecap. Tiny rocks and flecks of dirt mix with the torn skin. It’ll be sore for days, but he’ll live. 

“Just a scrape.” Harry says.

“Let’s get that cleaned up.” Louis stands, brushing the dirt off his hands, then offering a hand to pull Harry to his feet. Harry reaches out to take it, then sees that Louis’ knee is red too.

“Lou, you’re bleeding.”

Louis tugs at Harry’s arm as he stands up. Harry bends closer to inspect Louis’ injury. It looks similar to his own scrape, but with the blood smeared from how he’d been kneeling. Harry doesn’t remember Louis falling down during their spar. He’s the only klutzy one during practice. “When did that happen?”

“Oh. Umm.” Louis stammers and pushes the fringe from his eyes. “I think there’s a first aid kit in my bathroom,” he deflects. Louis opens the backdoor and Harry follows him down the hall to his room. They both walk with stiff left legs as they avoid extending their scraped knees.

“Hop up.” Louis pats the counter next to the sink. Harry hoists himself onto the counter as directed. Louis digs in the cabinet and pulls out an old army green metal lunchbox. Louis unsnaps the two clasps and lifts the lid. Inside is an assortment of very old bandages, wraps, and gauze. There’s also a bottle of hydrogen peroxide that has seen better days. The label flakes off as Louis moves it to the side. He pulls out a few gauze pads and bandages, sizing them up to the scrape on Harry’s knee. He works silently, methodically. Harry stares at Louis’ scraped knee, then back at his own. The nearly identical scrapes both have rivulets of blood drying down the shin. It’s so unusual.

Harry opens his mouth to ask a question, but closes it again when he can’t think of what to say. None of the words arrange in his mind to form a coherent question. He must be overthinking this weird situation.

“This might sting.” Louis begins to dab at the wound carefully with a damp cloth. He cleans out the rocks and dirt efficiently as harry bites at his knuckles to prevent himself from shouting or swearing. Louis winces, as if he hates the sight of blood, but continues working at the wound.

He gets the entire area clean and starts bandaging up his knee before he begins talking. “Um, the scrape on my knee. Is your scrape.” Louis says.

“Huh?”

“It started bleeding after you fell.” Louis tries to clarify. It doesn’t clarify anything.

“Are you sure you didn’t scrape your knee?” Harry tilts his head.

“I’m positive.” Louis sighs.

“That’s impossible.” Harry shakes his head.

“I don’t know why. Or how. But something weird has been going on. And I don’t know how to stop it. I can feel what you feel. And taste too. I noticed a few days ago.”

“So I got hurt and now you’re hurt too? How long has this been happening?”

“I, um, I realized it on Friday morning. But it’s been happening longer. Like a few weeks, I think. I just didn’t realize.” Louis shrugs.

“Oh.” Harry’s shoulders drop. He doesn’t know what to make of Louis’ explanation, so he doesn’t say anything.

“All done.” Louis taps Harry’s thigh above his knee. Harry hops off the counter, landing on his uninjured leg. Louis switches places and grabs a clean cloth to start cleaning his own wound. 

“Here, let me.” Harry takes the cloth from him and gently wipes at the drying rivulets of blood. They fall into silence as Harry cleans. As he looks closer at the wound, he notices that there are no rocks or dirt in the scrape. It’s weird, but it adds evidence to Louis’ claim.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.” Louis says. “But I wanted to know what was going on before I worried you. I’ve been trying to figure this out. I looked it up online but I couldn’t find anything.” 

Harry’s head jerks up, looking to Louis with wide eyes. “You get internet out here?” 

“No, when I went to town.”

“Oh, that makes sense.” Harry grabs for the bandages and begins wrapping Louis knee.

“Is it weird that it’s only happening to you? Why can’t I feel what you’re feeling?”

“I don’t know, H. Guess that’s part of the mystery.” Louis sounds resigned, as if he’s already accepted the fact that he can suddenly feel things that Harry experiences. But Harry isn’t ready to let this go.

The rest of the evening is filled with stilted discussions, out-of-the-box suggestions, and improbable theories. So many sentences start with ‘What if?’ or ‘Maybe it’s…’ But they don’t get any nearer to guessing the cause for the mysterious connection.

\- - -

“Morning” Harry’s sleep rough voice cracks as he greets Louis. Harry fills the kettle to make some tea. He’s too tired to attempt his elaborate pour-over coffee brewing process in his sleep-deprived state.

“Morning. You didn’t sleep much last night, did you?” Louis replies.

“You can’t feel that can you?” Harry’s eyebrows shoot up, concerned at how far this shared-senses thing might extend.

“No, just you look like shit.”

“Hey.” Harry pouts.

“Sorry.” Louis chuckles. 

The kettle clicks off. Harry pours the water over the tea bags and carries the two steaming mugs to join Louis at the table. Neither of them bother to make a solid breakfast, their stomachs not settled enough for solid food. 

“No, I didn’t sleep much. I couldn’t stop thinking of all the possibilities and how we might fix this.” 

“Same. Did you think of anything?” Louis asks, sounding hopeful.

“I don’t have a clue where to even start. Do you have any guesses?” 

“The best guess I’ve come up with have is maybe some sort of curse. But I don’t know how we would’ve been cursed. We haven’t left the cabin much.” Louis shrugs.

“A curse?” Harry’s brow creases. He considers Louis’ idea.

“Yeah, like with witches and stuff.” Louis shrugs. “There were always myths and stories about an old coven of witches that lived in the forests at the base of the mountains. They were said to cast strange spells to keep people away from their territory. Maybe there’s one here? But I don’t know any witches, so I’m not positive how any of that works.”

“I know a witch. I could try to call her if my phone worked.” Harry’s shoulders slump forward.

“Oh, my phone works. You just have to stand at the edge of the porch to get signal. It might be a little spotty, but it’s worth a shot.”

“I didn’t know that.” Harry sits up straighter in his chair.

“Yeah, didn’t think it was worth mentioning. You seemed happy enough to be off the grid for a while.”

“Yeah, it has been nice not having to answer to anyone except you.” Harry’s words trail off at the admission. “I think I’ll give her a call later. It’s too early.”

They put aside the discussion until later, agreeing that there isn’t much that can be done, and they should focus on training so they don’t fall behind. As it is, they still have six days of training left before they return to LA.

During one of the breaks in their practice, they’re sitting on the front step talking through their current problem. Their thighs are nearly touching and Harry can feel the heat radiating off of Louis’ body. It’s distracting.

“Here,” Louis hands over his phone. “How about you give your friend a call. If you sit still where you are, it should go through.”

“Thanks.” Harry takes the unlocked phone and dials the number he’d written on a scrap of paper. He had turned his phone on briefly after breakfast to find her number, but some notifications had come through despite the minimal service, so he was sure to turn it off without looking through any of them. He wasn’t ready to return to the state of being constantly on and available. 

The phone rings. And rings. And rings. There is a mechanical click and then a crackly recording plays, “Hey, you’ve reached Stevie. I’m away. Leave a message.” _Beep._

“Umm, hi Stevie. It’s Harry. Uh Styles. Harry Styles. I have a question for you. Well, more like a bunch of questions. It’s complicated. And it’s sort of urgent so if you can call me back, that would be great. Oh, yeah. I’m on my friend’s phone, so you can call me back at this number. Otherwise I won’t get it. Uh, yeah. Hope to talk to you soon. Lots of love, bye.” Harry hangs up and cringes at the terrible rambling message that Louis just overheard him record.

“No answer?”

“No, she didn’t pick up.” 

“Damn.” Louis takes back his phone.

“And it could take her a few days to respond. You never know with her.”

“I guess we can leave the phone out here so her call will go through.” He flips the ringer switch into the on position and sets the phone in between two of the railings on the porch. 

Louis stares out into the forest in front of them, seemingly lost in thought. After a few minutes of silence he says, “Why isn’t this easier?” Louis sighs and drops his head in his hands. 

“We could always go into town, use the internet.” 

“Already tried that. I spent a good three hours at the library and didn’t get anywhere. And I think the librarian is suspicious of me. I took some notes while I was there but there wasn’t much info. I don’t think the witch community has embraced the internet enough to broadcast their spells.”

“What about ways to break a curse? Like smudging or something?”

“The general store didn’t have any sage so smudging is out of the question. The only other suggestion I found was to take a bath in salt water. I don’t think we even have enough salt here to try that.” 

“Well, let's keep that thought. We can always buy some salt if nothing else works.” Harry states pragmatically.

“But, what else could it be?” 

“What if it’s not a curse? What if it’s something else. Maybe it’s like a sympathy pain type thing.”

“Sympathy pains?” Louis tilts his head to the side.

“Yeah, you know, like those stories of expectant fathers feeling the same things as the expectant mothers. They can mirror the symptoms throughout the pregnancy and labour. Maybe we have something similar since we’ve been working and living so close to each other. Then it would go away once we leave the cabin and go back to LA.” A hollow ache fills Harry’s chest at the thought of leaving the cabin. He’s not ready to return to LA. He will miss the quiet, all the wildlife and stars, and Louis’ company when he goes home.

“I don’t know. I think that has more to do with hormones and such.”

“Yeah, probably.” Harry deflates a bit. They’re quiet in thought again for a while, both thinking away.

“How about the fairy tales?” Louis says. “Like, there’s spells and curses and shit in those. How do they figure it out?”

“True love’s kiss.” Harry replies. He goes still as he registered what he has said, unfiltered by his common sense.

“A kiss? I mean, we could try. At least we wouldn’t have to drive all the way into town to buy something.” Louis laughs off the suggestion.

“Really?” Harry bites at his lower lip. Alarm bells go off in his head. Kissing Louis would not do well for the crush he is meant to be hiding. He tunes out the mental alarms, curious to see if the fairy tale remedy will work for their situation.

“Yeah, why not.” Louis shrugs. “Do you want to try?”

“I guess.” Harry says, but his voice catches and it comes out a little squeaky. And that’s how Harry finds himself sat on a front porch, Louis leaning in to kiss him. 

Louis pauses just centimeters from Harry’s lips. “Are you sure?”

“Um hm.” Harry hums and leans forward to connect their lips. It starts soft, their lips meeting. Louis leans in closer. Harry pushes back, intensifying the kiss. He parts his lips slightly, and Louis responds. The kiss deepens. Harry pulls Louis in with a hand in his hair. Louis leans in closer, balances himself with a hand on the middle of Harry’s thigh. The heat of his palm felt through the thin material of his gym shorts turns Harry on even more. He moans. The sound startles him out of his trance and he pulls back from the kiss. 

Their eyes meet, dark with lust. Neither says anything for a moment, not sure how to process what just happened, or how this might change the rest of their time at the cabin. 

“So did it work?” harry is the first to speak, voice rough from the thick desire. 

“I’m not sure. I can’t sense everything you can. Just pain and pleasure, and when you eat.”

“Pleasure? Wait,” Harry is puzzled. His face heats in embarrassment as he recalls the few times he’d gotten himself off in the past week. “Like…”

“Yep. I didn’t know how to bring that part up.” Louis says, looking abashed.

“You mean…” Harry is speechless, not sure how to phrase the question he needs to ask. Luckily, or unfortunately depending on how he looks at it, Louis doesn’t wait for him to ask the question, before he gives him confirmation.

“I could feel all of that. Um. Yeah. That’s actually how I figured out this whole thing.” 

“Oh. Oh god. You could feel that.” He buries his face in his hands, trying to override the burning desire to crawl under a rock and hide. 

Despite his embarrassment, Harry can’t curb his curiosity. “What did it feel like?” 

“Like any other hand job. Or fingering. But without the actual hands.” 

Harry considers Louis’ words, remembering everything he did that night and how good it felt to finally get off so thoroughly. He flushes as he recalls slowly teasing his nipples and his cock and then fucking himself with his fingers until he’d come untouched. “Wow. This makes things awkward.”

“It doesn’t have to.” Louis’ face is blank, not giving away anything he is feeling. When Harry stays quiet Louis continues. “We’re both adults, in a very strange and unexplainable situation. We can agree to just go on like nothing happened. We don’t have to make a big deal of that’s what you want. I’d understand if you’re uncomfortable.”

Harry wrings his hands as he thinks, twisting at the metal ring around his middle finger. 

Louis gets up. “I’m gonna head inside, give you some space to think. Let me know if you want to talk about it.”

It’s nearly a half hour later when Harry finally goes inside searching for Louis. Louis is sitting in a chair reading a book. “What if I can’t go on like nothing happened.” 

“Huh?” Louis looks up.

“You said we could put it behind us like nothing happened if I want to. But I don’t want to. I can’t put this behind us. Not if you want it too. Because I can’t stop picturing you, imagining you, spread out with my fingers in you, or my mouth on your cock, or you riding me. It’s all I can think about.”

Louis drops his book and rushes over to Harry. They kiss deep and hot. Louis pulls him in with a solid hand on the back of his neck and Harry balances himself, placing his hands around Louis’ waist. They aren’t cautiously testing out a kiss to break a curse this time. It’s passionate and it’s desperate. 

Harry taps Louis’ hip. Louis gets the memo and jumps into Harry’s arms and he carries him to his room. He lays Louis on top of his bed and begins stripping off his own clothes. Louis’ clothes follow his, tossed to the floor in their haste. Harry sits on his heels, hovering above Louis, admiring the toned muscle and tanned skin of the man laid out beneath him. Louis makes grabby hands toward Harry and pulls him into another kiss. His tongue licks at the crease of Harry’s mouth and he opens willingly. He ruts against Louis’ thigh, seeking much needed friction. This will be over too soon if he continues like this. 

He breaks the kiss and trails his lips down the expanse of Louis’ neck and chest. He leaves a love bite on the curve of one of his collar bones. Louis moans beautifully for him. Then he trails further down and licks a stripe up his cock. That’s all the warning he gives before he takes Louis’ cock into his mouth. He takes the length in his mouth and relaxes his jaw. He goes lower, taking all of Louis into his mouth. Harry moans. Louis makes a choking sound and taps frantically on Harry’s shoulder. 

Harry pulls off and looks up to find Louis wide-eyed and breathing hard. “What’s wrong?” Harry wipes at the saliva around his mouth with the back of his hand. He scrambles up the bed when Louis takes too long to respond and still looks dazed.. 

“Holy shit,” Louis’ voice cracks. Louis clears his throat.

“What? Is something wrong?”

“No, just I could feel that.”

“Oh my god.” Harry’s mouth falls open. 

“I wasn’t expecting to feel it. And you have no gag reflex.”

“I’m sorry.” Harry pouts.

“Don’t apologize for that.” Louis brings his palm to Harry’s cheek, caressing his face. His thumb presses softly at the space where Harry’s dimple would be. Louis shrugs and drops his hand. “You just can’t deep throat me until we get whatever this thing is between us figured out.” 

“So does this mean we can’t continue?” Harry asks, worried how he’d fare if they have to put everything on hold now that he’s had a taste. 

“Of course not. But if I’m gonna feel a dick in my mouth, I’d rather it be your’s than mine.” 

Harry laughs. A sanguine smile stretches across his face, making his dimples appear. “Well that can be arranged.” Harry kisses Louis chastely on the lips and then flips himself around, landing on his side. “There, problem solved.”

Louis laughs and shakes his head. “Alright. I guess that’s one way to do it.” Louis shift down the bed, aligning himself with Harry’s cock as Harry gets back to Louis’. Harry can feel his tentative licks and moans as Louis takes him into his mouth finally. He tries to mirror the feeling of what Louis is doing to him, not wanting to cause him to choke like before. When Louis switches to kitten licks over the tip, Harry does too. When Louis takes Harry deep and slow, Harry swallows around Louis. They are a tangle of limbs and heat, writhing on the bed as they get each other off in tandem. 

Unexpectedly, Louis scratches his blunt nails down Harry’s thigh. The hint of pain scraping across his skin surprises him. He growls around Louis’ length and he comes, spilling into Louis’ waiting mouth without warning. It’s not long before Louis is moaning around his cock and spilling down his throat. Harry swallows his release and cleans his softening cock with his tongue. When Louis pulls away from the sensitivity, Harry let’s his length fall against his thigh. He flips around and curls up against Louis’ chest. Content and sated, they both fall asleep, napping away the rest of the afternoon.

\- - -

Samantha, the costume designer, pulls up the driveway in an old rental minivan after lunch. She takes command of the cabin upon her arrival and immediately enlists Louis as her temporary assistant for the day. Due to budget restraints, her assistant wasn’t allowed to fly out to the remote cabin with her. She sets up her equipment in the living room after Louis pushes some of the furniture out of the way.

When she is ready to begin, she calls Harry back into the room. 

Harry is excited to work with Samantha again. He cannot wait to see what she has in store for Antonius, as gladiator costumes from ancient Rome are so much different than the ‘70s business attire she’d designed for his character in _Ever Since New York_. Her vision for costume designs are always stunning and her costumes add an extra spark to the character on screen. He is sure the newest costumes will not disappoint. 

Samantha flips through the handful of garment bags carefully hung up on the travel-sized garment rack. “Here’s the first one, Harry.”

She slowly drags the zipper down the bag, the protective fabric parting to reveal an oatmeal colored linen tunic. She extracted the tunic from its hanger.

Harry strips off his shirt and shorts efficiently, having been through the costume fitting process so many times that he knows what to expect.

She hands over the tunic and helps him pull the folds of fabric over his head and down his frame. She fusses with the folds and drape of the fabric for a few minutes before she steps back to assess her work.

The tunic feels forgein, but not bad. The tunic extends to just above his knees, leaving his legs bare. The scab on his knee from the other day is visible, though Samantha doesn’t ask about it. The sleeves are cut short, ending mid bicep. It is surprisingly light and comfortable, despite the amount of fabric draped around his frame. Harry could get used to wearing this for the next few months of filming. 

Samantha nods to herself and then begins making some minor adjustments, asking Louis to bring over a pin cushion and clips. She begins pinching and stretching the fabric along Harry’s back. 

“I knew you’d be working out since we took your first measurements, so I made allowances for changes in your body when putting all of these costumes together.” Samantha explains as she starts meticulously adjusting and pinning the fabric. “Before I leave, I’d like to get a new set of measurements to get the most accurate fit before we start filming in October.”

“Sure, we can do that.” Harry says. “Ouch.” Harry exclaims as one of the pins catches a bit of his skin.

“Ow, watch what you’re doing. Don’t go sticking pins in him.” Louis exclaims. He must have felt the pinprick too.

“It’s okay.” Harry says, trying to calm Louis down. He doesn’t know how he could explain their strange situation to Samantha if Louis caused a scene.

“Sorry, I try not to do that, it’s a hazard of the occupation.” Samantha jokes.

When the adjustments are done, she snaps a few pictures on her phone for reference before Harry takes it off. He’s left standing in the living room in only his pants as he waits for the next costume. Samantha is careful not to catch any fabric in the teeth as she zips the tunic back into the garment bag. Then she pulls out the next one. It’s a similar tunic with a darker brown fabric. The fit is much the same, though this one is sleeveless. Samantha continues her process, pinning and adjusting, and taking pictures of the second garment. 

Two more tunics follow. Harry is growing bored of the process and zones out. He finds himself watching Louis from the corner of his eye as Louis carries the pin cushion and holds folds of fabric as Samantha pins them. Louis is very focused on the work, carefully following Samantha’s instructions and anticipating her needs as they circle around Harry. It’s a new side to him that Harry hasn’t seen before. 

They go through the entire garment rack. Harry is a bit confused when she pulls the last garment bag open to reveal yet another linen tunic. He hasn’t seen even a hint of battle armour. He had been hoping to get to try on the main costume for Antonius, but he doesn’t want to interrupt Samantha’s process to ask questions either. So he stays quiet through yet another tunic fitting until he is given the instruction to take it off.

“We’ve got one more, are you ready for the real showstopper?” Samantha says. Excitement erupts in Harry’s chest. She lifts a duffle bag from the floor places it onto the coffee table. Samantha is standing in front of the table, blocking Harry’s view as she unzips the bag and removes pieces of the costume. He gets glimpses of crimson fabric and brown leather, but can’t see much else. 

Louis hovers near the edge of the room and he must be able to see what is on the table. Harry looks toward him. He is smirking, mouth pinched as if he is trying to suppress the smile. From the way he keeps wringing his hands and rocking from one foot to the other, Harry can guess that he is eager to see the next costume. 

When Samantha finally steps aside to reveal it, Harry gasps and covers his mouth. 

An assortment of pieces are laid out on the table. Even from where he stands in the middle of the room he can see the detail and effort that Samantha and her team put into designing these pieces. There are decorative brass fasteners on many of the pieces, metal embellishments around the belt, and gilded stitching to accent some of the seams on the red fabric. It’s glorious and regal.

“It’s beautiful!” Harry exclaims.

“Thank you. Now, let’s put it on!” Samantha says.

They start with the stockings. They’re thin and tight, accentuating the toned muscles of his legs as he pulls the fabric over his calves. They end just below the knee and have a bit of golden embroidery around the top edge. Next, she hands him what appears to be a leather skirt. He holds it up in front of him, inspecting it. She explains, “This is the Ptergues, a defensive skirt made of leather strips.” 

He steps into the opening and pulls it over his hips. There’s one brass button on the side to fasten it securely around his waist. It fits a bit loose and keeps falling down. He holds it up on one side until Samantha grabs a clip from Louis to cinch the excess fabric in the back. The leather strips swing freely from the waist, but the two alternating layers provide enough coverage to prevent an obscene wardrobe malfunction. After the skirt comes a belt and shin guards. Both are heavily adorned with decorative brass elements, embossed with miniature laurel wreaths and eagles. They bear a striking resemblance to Harry’s own tattoos but he doesn’t mention it. He knows that his tattoos will be covered by makeup and edited out, so he is excited that at least some of his tattoos will be, in a way, visible on Antonius. 

A leather vest follows. Samantha helps him pull it over his head and fasten all of the buckles. A metal shoulder plate and two matching forearm guards follow. Each one features an ornate eagle embossed with a banner that reads “Libertas” below. Samantha ties the leather straps to secure each one into place. 

The weight of all the pieces is starting to add up and Harry takes a moment to assess his battle armour. Antonius is more tangible than ever and Harry is feeling primed for battle. He wants to see himself in a mirror. But there’s still a few pieces to go. 

Samantha hands him a pair of sandals with leather laces. He normally despises the socks-and-sandals look, but he gives Samantha the benefit of the doubt on this one and laces them up over his stockings.

“Here’s the final piece.” Samantha holds out a brass helmet between her hands and extends it to Harry. It’s very light and not as protective as the helmets he’d seen during his research into gladiator armour. But then again, the audience will want to see his face during the battle, so that is to be expected. He takes it and places it on his head. Samantha takes a step back and claps her hands together once. “And that’s it! What do you think?” 

Harry considers the costume. There’s a weight to the pieces and the overall feel of the costume resonates with the Antonius he has constructed from the script. “It’s amazing! You’ve outdone yourself,” he compliments.

“And Louis, what do you think?”

In all the distraction of donning the elaborate multi-piece costume, Harry had forgotten that Louis was standing to the side, watching the whole transformation. “Oh, uh” He seems surprised to be called on for an opinion, standing straighter and walking closer. “It’s great. Really realistic. Yeah.” He flicks his fringe out of his face.

Harry wants to laugh. Louis seems so out of it. And then, an idea strikes Harry. “Hey, Samantha, I’d love to try out all the armour with the sword and shield. You know, to get the whole effect.”

“I don’t know. It’s pretty risky to use it before filming.”

“Please?” Harry pulls out his best puppy-dog-eyed look. “I’ll be super careful. And it would be good to try it in action to see if it needs any changes when I’m in battle.”

“Alright, fine. But just for a little bit.”

“Yes! Come on Lou. Grab the swords.” Harry runs out into the garden. 

“Be careful!” Samantha calls after him.

Louis and Samantha follow Harry into the garden. When Louis hands him his gladius and shield, there is a fire in his eyes. Where he’d seemed distracted and skittish inside, Louis looks fierce and determined as he takes his stance. 

They shuffle around the yard, sparring lightly to appease Samantha. Harry understands how much time and effort she has put into this costume. He doesn’t want to be responsible for wrecking the clothing after promising that he would be careful. As they spar, Harry takes stock of the costume. Surprisingly, the added battle gear does not hinder his movements. A part of him had been terrified that the weight of all this gear would set him back, as the addition of the shield had. But so far, battling with the full costume on feels natural and comfortable. 

They spar for a few minutes, stopping when Harry notices how anxious Samantha looks at every stumble he takes. Louis and Harry wrap up their battle and then join Samantha on the patio. Harry pulls off the helmet and shakes out his hair.

“So, how did it hold up in battle, Mr. Gladiator?” Samantha asks.

“It was great. Feels really comfortable and I can move around really well. It’s really exciting to be wearing all of this.” Harry motions at himself, sweeping his hands from his shoulders down.

“Anything you think needs to be changed?”

“No, it’s perfect.” Harry says. “Could we take some pictures?” 

“Yes, let’s take a few with the sword and shield and I can send them to the producers when I get back.”

“Okay.” Harry agrees.

“I’ll go grab my phone. Be right back.” Samantha heads inside, the screen door screeches as she opens it. As soon as Samantha turns the corner, Louis pushes Harry against the cabin. His hands on his shoulders pin Harry against the wall. 

“I can’t get over how hot you look. This costume is fucking obscene.” Louis presses his groin against Harry’s thigh, the leather skirt parts as Louis ruts into his leg. Harry swears and his head falls back against the wall with a thud. He kisses Harry’s collarbone. Louis suddenly bites down, sucking a small mark into the exposed skin right above the leather vest and Harry’s mind goes blank. He pulls Louis back for another kiss, parting his lips for Louis to lick into his mouth. 

The screen door screeches, alerting them to Samantha’s return. “I’m not done with you yet.” Louis whispers, words hot against Harry’s ear before he backs off and adjusts himself. Harry is left panting and half-hard, straightening out the sections of his skirt as Samantha returns with her phone in hand. 

She begins an impromptu photo shoot, posing Harry with and without his weapons and at different angles. Louis watches from the patio, the heat in his stare burning through the layers of leather and linen. After dozens of photos have been snapped, Samantha is satisfied and ready to go back inside. 

“Let’s get this one packed up. I will grab one last set of measurements, and then I’ll be out of your hair.” Samantha directs.

Samantha helps Harry untie and unbuckle the various pieces, as Louis places each one in the bag. Fortunately, he’s had long enough to calm himself down during the photo shoot and he is no longer sporting a semi by the time they remove the skirt. When he’s been stripped of everything save his pants, Samantha grabs her measuring tape. She quickly stretches the tape and calls out numbers to Louis, who is diligently recording each in her notepad.

When she finishes, Harry redresses, pulling on the shorts and shirt he’d left in a pile on the couch. Louis works on putting the furniture back into position, and Samantha packs up her belongings. They carry everything out to her rental van and bid her goodbye.

As soon as the crunch of gravel down the driveway fades, Louis pounces. He jumps into Harry’s arms and attacks the same spot on his neck as earlier. Harry carries him to his bedroom without question. Louis slides down his torso and begins pulling off his clothes. They fall into bed, kissing fast and hot and rutting against each other, desperate for friction. 

Louis rolls them over, straddling Harry and leaning down to capture his mouth in another kiss. Harry moans as Louis nips at his bottom lip. Harry thrusts his hips up, wordlessly asking for more. When he brings his hands up to card through Louis’ hair, Louis breaks the kiss, grabs a wrist in each hand and pins them against the bed. Harry struggles at the restraint at first, but when Louis’ grip tightens, he stills and melts into the mattress. 

“Is this okay?” Louis asks. 

“Yes.” Harry says, nodding. 

“Good. Keep them there.” Louis squeezes his wrists again before letting go. Harry feels the pressure even after Louis’ hands have moved down his body and he keeps his hands above his head. His cock is so hard and he’s never been this turned on. 

Louis trails wet kisses down his torso and to his hip. He kisses each leaf of the two laurel branches framing his cock. Harry is desperate and wants Louis to take him into his mouth, hold him in his hand, anything for some relief. Instead, Louis sits back onto his heels and looks over Harry, as if assessing him. The stare is intense and Harry closes his eyes. 

“Where’s your lube?” Louis asks.

“Over there, in the black bag inside the suitcase.” Harry points at the dresser near the far wall.

“I told you not to move your hands.” Louis reprimands.

Harry drops his arm back heavily, feeling the sting of disappointment in Louis’ words. Louis climbs off the bed and searches through the bag until he finds the lube and condoms.

He returns to the bed, tapping on Harry’s calf to signal him to spread his legs. He crawls between Harry’s legs and drops the condom and lube on the mattress. “Can I fuck you?” Louis asks without prompt.

“Please.” The reply comes out softly. Louis taps his hip and he raises them to situate a pillow below him. Louis opens the lube and prepares two fingers. Harry shivers as the cool lube drips down his perineum and then without warning there is a cool finger pressing against his hole. His breath catches.

“I know you like to tease yourself, draw this out.” Louis says as he presses incrementally further, barely breaching the ring of muscle. “Play with yourself until you can’t hold back.” He continues pressing in slowly, up to the first knuckle. “You teased and you teased, and I had to take it all. But now it’s my turn. And I’m not as patient as you, especially after seeing you on display in that gladiator outfit.” He presses his finger in the rest of the way and immediately searches out Harry’s spot. He rubs a finger teasingly across his spot and Harry arches his back into the instant pleasure. Louis presses his hand to Harry’s hip holding him in place.

Louis begins to thrust in and out, avoiding the spot every time. Almost too soon, he adds a second finger. He thrusts his fingers until Harry begins to rock his hips into the motion. He withdraws his fingers. Harry whines, but his frustration is short lived as Louis returns with three fingers. Harry tries to stay still, not wanting to make Louis upset again, but it feels so good. 

“More, Lou.” Harry begs. Louis brushes teasingly against his spot once more before removing his fingers. He quickly opens the condom and puts it on. Then he lines up his cock and presses the tip to Harry’s hole. 

They both moan obscenely as Louis presses forward. When he’s pressed in, his hips against Harry’s Louis drops his forehead to Harry’s. His eyes are closed and he’s breathing hard. 

“You okay, Lou?” Harry says, voice low and rough. 

“Mmm, yeah. Feel full.” It takes a moment for his words to register in Harry’s lust fogged mind. Louis must be feeling himself as if he were being fucked. 

“Holy shit.” He whispers reverently.

“Feels so good.” Louis growls deep in his throat, as if he’s struggling to control himself. Louis starts rocking his hips in slow, shallow thrusts. His length hits deep inside Harry, dragging against his walls. His cock is trapped between their two torsos, getting some much needed friction. Louis’ pace quickens and he groans as he shifts angle to hit Harry’s spot. Harry clenches around him and brings his arms down, scratching across Louis back. He’s had good sex before, but this is unbelievably, otherworldly incredible sex. 

He starts to thrust his own hips off the bed, matching Louis’ slow thrusts to urge him to go faster. Louis speeds up and leans down, catching Harry’s mouth in a sloppy kiss, which breaks into Louis mouthing at the bruised love bite on Harry’s collarbone that he’d left earlier. He thrusts powerful, longer and harder. Harry moans at the new pace. He reaches a hand down to pull himself off, so close. Louis swats his hand away and then pins his wrist to his side, wordlessly commanding him to not move it. Louis wraps a hand around Harry’s length instead. He moves his fist along with his hips, the dry drag of his palm on the right side of pain and brings Harry just to the edge. Harry thrusts his hips up meeting every hard thrust from Louis. 

Overwhelmed by the sensations, Louis comes. His hips still as he releases into the condom, deep inside Harry. Harry thrusts, working him through his orgasm as his own washes over him. Louis continues to uncoordinatedly pull Harry through his orgasm. They collapse into a heap, sweaty and sticky, and sore. Louis’ softening cock is still inside him and Louis’ come covered hand squashed between their bodies. 

As they take a moment to catch their breath, Louis comments “You’ve ruined me! I don’t think anything will ever beat a phantom threesome.”

Harry playfully slaps Louis’ arse cheek. “I bet we could find a way to beat it, if we think hard enough.” 

“Is that a challenge?” Louis raises an eyebrow suggestively as they both fall into laughter.


	10. Chapter 10

“So you can taste that?” Harry asks after chewing a bite of toast.

“Yep.” Louis says.

“And this?” Harry asks after swallowing a sip of coffee.

“Unfortunately.” Louis grimaces.

“That’s so weird. But you can’t smell what I smell?”

“Nope.”

“Huh.”

Louis continues to field Harry’s questions throughout the day. His curiosity has helped Louis to narrow in on some of the limits and boundaries of the connection. So far he has figured out that it thankfully only applies to two of the five senses and that it has grown stronger since the first time he remembers experiencing the weird connection. It started as only Harry’s most intense pains and pleasures. But recently he’s been experiencing more subtle exchanges.

Like at breakfast, when he could taste ground black pepper, even though only Harry added the seasoning to his eggs. Or before dinner, when he felt the heat from the hot pan that Harry pulled out of the oven with a thin pot holder. While it wasn’t painful, he could still feel it. 

It worries Louis that they are still no closer to figuring out what has caused the connection. And now because of the increasing strength of the shared connection, there’s a rising sense of urgency to figure it out. But at least Louis’ not alone in his worry. While Harry hasn’t outright said that he’s worried, Louis can see that this is affecting him just as much. He releases an anxious sigh with each unanswered question, and he hunches his shoulders a bit more with each failed hypothesis.

They settle down for the night, curling up on the couch. Louis wraps himself in a blanket as Harry sets up their nightly movie. It’s another old western. After pressing play, he returns to the couch and sinks into the cushion next to Louis. As the movie begins, Harry is more uneasy than usual. It takes him a while to settle onto the couch, tucking his leg underneath him, then stretching them out onto the coffee table, before finally flopping them over the arm of the couch and laying his head in Louis’ lap. His restless energy finally leaves him as Louis starts petting his hair and scraping his blunt nails gently across his scalp. 

Louis’ fingers in his hair calm Harry enough to let out the thoughts that had been banging against his mind all night. The questions start flowing again.

“Can you feel this?” Harry asks, like the dozens of times when Harry had looked to Louis with the same apprehensive curiosity. Louis understands that his apprehension stems from the lack of autonomy in sharing one’s body with another.

“No, only when I do this.” Louis scratches his nails with a bit more pressure. Tingles run down Louis’ spine and he shivers. Harry holds back a groan by biting his lip. 

“Can you feel when I’m turned on? Or is it only when I touch myself?” 

“I’m not sure. I think it’s only with touch.” 

“Huh.” Harry turns back to the movie, rolling onto his side and nudging his head into Louis’ hand where he’d stopped petting his hair.

Louis chuckles under his breath and returns his fingers to the soft curls, combing through them languidly. Harry is focused on the movie, so Louis tries to pick up on the plot that’s thirty minutes in. It’s some intense drama between two men, but he doesn’t know what is going on. On screen two men argue about the stock market, but Louis can’t follow and doesn’t know how it connects into the plot anyway. The music on screen intensifies, and Louis feels his cock twitch in his pants. He ignores it. He shifts his weight, careful not to jostle Harry’s head too much as he tries to hide his problem.

He thinks Harry may have fallen asleep. He’s been completely still, even after Louis had stopped moving his fingers through his hair. His problem doesn’t go away, despite his effort to focus on the movie for over ten minutes. And then Louis feels a sudden rush of heat flooding his veins and Harry moans.

“What are you doing?” Louis asks cautiously, suspicious of Harry’s involvement with his own growing problem. He leans forward to look Harry in the eye, but his eyes are closed.

“Testing out a theory.” Harry murmurs.

“What theory?” Harry doesn’t respond. There’s a raging gun fight on screen, but Louis’ eyes don’t leave Harry’s face. He’s watching him closely, but he’s getting even more turned on. He reaches down to subtly adjust himself in his pants and Harry’s eyes open. 

“So you _can_ feel that. Interesting.”

“Feel what?” Louis shifts to look down at Harry’s face. His eyes are completely blown, dark with desire.

“This.” Harry grabs himself over the fabric of his shorts and squeezes his length once. 

“Jesus.” Louis’ body rushes all the blood south to catch up with Harry’s. He’s fully hard faster than he thought possible. 

“Well, you can sense when I’m turned on. Unless you were fantasizing something too.” Harry says, smirking up at Louis.

“Nope. Just innocently trying to watch the movie. What were you fantasizing about that got you all worked up?”

“That’s a secret.” Harry mimes zipping his lip and tossing the key. Then he smiles wide, the hint of a dimple popping.

“Too kinky to share?” Louis teases and pokes a finger at his dimple.

“Something like that.” Harry giggles. 

“You little minx.” Louis says. “Come here.” He pulls at Harry’s arm, urging Harry to sit up and sit on his lap. They kiss teasingly at first, but it grows sloppy, more tongue and teeth as they both grow needy. Louis turns them and lies back on the couch, pulling Harry down with him. Harry thigh slots between his legs and they both groan at the welcome friction. They make out at rut against each other like teenagers, too worked up to bother with their clothes. It feels quick and dirty, and is over much too soon. Louis curses as he comes and Harry finishes soon after. Their pants grow sticky soon enough, so they head off to shower before falling into Louis’ bed for the night.

\- - -

The next day is focused on choreographing the fight scenes according to the script. With only a handful of days left at the cabin, Louis is using Harry to polish up the positioning and sequences, while Harry is able to get extra practice before they start filming. Every so often Louis takes a moment to jot down notes on his beat up copy of the script. 

They’re working through the climactic weaponless fight between Magnus and Antonius once again. Louis and Harry are grappling on the ground. There is noticeably less cautious restraint in Harry’s movements than when they had first learned the moves for this scene. Louis chalks that up to the amount of sex they’ve been having over the past few days. 

Harry tackles Louis, but Louis gets the upper hand and immediately rolls them in the grass, straddling him and locking him down tight. Harry struggles to free himself from the weight of Louis, but Louis grabs his wrists tight before he leans down and kisses him.

“Hey! That’s not part of the script.” Harry tries to pull his hands free.

“All’s fair in love and war, babe.” The words leave his mouth before he considers that they might suggest more between the lines than he is ready to reveal. He’s not meant to fall for Harry and he’s definitely not meant to let Harry know that he might be developing feelings. But before he can divert Harry’s attention from his slip up, he is saved by his ringing phone. He nearly misses the sound of his phone, the shrill ringtone on the loudest setting is barely audible around the back of the cabin. He quickly scrambles off of Harry, and takes off running.

“My phone’s ringing!” Louis shouts over his shoulder before rounding the corner.

He reaches for the phone and sees “Stevie✨” is calling. Harry must have added her number to his contacts when he’d made the call. He slides the button to answer and prays that the call will connect with the one bar of service. Harry rushes around the corner and he pushes the speaker button, too.

“Hello?” Louis answers. 

“Hi, this is Stevie. Is Harry there?”

“Hi Stevie.” Harry answers. “It’s Harry. And Louis Tomlinson, the stunt choreographer for my next movie. 

“Hi.” Louis says.

“How are you?” Harry asks.

“I’m good. How are you doing? You’d mentioned you had some questions?” 

“We do, yeah. We’ve gotten ourselves into a bit of a situation and you were the only person I could think of that might have some idea of what’s going on.” Harry replies.

“Okay, I’m listening.” Stevie says.

“Well, I noticed a few days ago that I can feel things that Harry feels.” Louis explains. “At first it was only occasionally with pain, but it’s been getting stronger. I can feel lots of things and taste what he tastes too.”

“But I can’t feel or taste anything that Louis can.” Harry adds on. “So, do you think you can help?”

“Right, right. Well, that does sound like some sort of magic. Let me think for a moment.” The sound of a book slamming on a table and papers shuffling comes through the speaker. Stevie hums and haws for a few minutes, not adding much to give away what she’s looking at. Finally her voice comes back over the line, “Boys, you still there?”

“Yes.” They respond in unison.

“I have good and bad news.”

“What’s the bad news?” Harry asks, his voice hesitant.

“Well, the bad news is I couldn’t find any specific cases like what you’d described. I’d have to do more digging and that could take a while.”

“Oh.” Harry sighs. Louis places a supportive palm against his back.

“The good news is that it doesn’t seem like anything harmful. It’s not a curse or any dark magic. From what you’ve described, the link you described is similar to the effects of most love spells or potions that I’ve seen. But it could be anything, depending on the witch that originated it.”

“Love spells? Really?” Louis says, raising his eyebrows in shock.

“Yeah, a majority of love spells work by increasing awareness of one person to the other, so that an attraction can form between the two.”

“Alright, so how do we break a love spell?” Harry asks without pause, impatiently tapping his ring against the porch railing.

“It’s impossible to say without knowing the specifics of the spell. It can vary depending on the intent of the caster and the people affected, plus the elements involved with casting the spell or brewing the potion.”

“So we’re stuck like this?” Harry sounds appalled, like being stuck in a love spell with Louis would be the worst outcome he can think of. Louis bristles at his harsh tone. While he isn’t too keen to be stuck like this either, being connected to Harry hasn’t been that bad. 

“Not necessarily,” Stevie says. Harry exhales loudly. “I actually have some connections in the area where you’re staying. There was a coven up there that would often visit mine when we were more active. I can try to reach out to them to see if they’d be willing to meet with you.”

“Yeah that would be fantastic. We can meet whenever, but we are scheduled to return to LA on Tuesday, so the sooner the better.” While Harry tells Stevie more about their connection, Louis tunes out of the conversation. Instead, he gets swept away by his own internal thoughts. 

What will his life be like when they return to LA? Will he still be able to feel everything Harry is feeling when they are on opposite ends of the city, or will they have figured out how to break the spell by then? 

As he contemplates, he stares at the sleeve of tattoos visible on his arm as he leans against the porch railing, admiring the puzzling assortment of designs not unlike the ink on his own arm. 

All of the attraction, or dare he say love, Louis has been feeling for Harry is sitting at the surface of his mind. But the possibility of a love spell casts a shadow of a doubt over every emotion he is feeling. Are they being manipulated by magic into falling for each other?

He’d been prepared for something horrendous like a terrible curse, an alien abduction, or some sort of sci-fi nonsense. But a love spell is different. It is less threatening, but more terrifying. And it could change everything between him and Harry.

The lack of answers and growing doubts about his feelings unnerves Louis. But, before he can think too hard about “what ifs” and “how comes”, Harry ends the call with Stevie. They both say goodbye before Harry disconnects the call.

“So, a love spell?” Louis asks, unsure of what Harry is thinking. He starts to tap his foot and hum to some tune he can’t name.

“I think it’s really too soon to make conclusions.” Harry’s face remains unreadable. “Even Stevie had said she wasn’t positive, so it still could be anything. I don’t think it’s worth stressing over until we hear from the local coven.” 

“Those witches had better have a damn good explanation for whatever this is.” Louis stomps his foot petulantly. “I want answers.”

\- - -

Harry and Louis are crowded in the shower stall in Louis’ en suite. It’s the bigger of the two showers, but it’s still not meant for two full grown men. With two days of training left, Louis had been relentless and demanding. The promise of a blow job in the shower after practice was the only thing that kept Harry going through the grueling drills. It had sounded heavenly, but the blow job does not live up to his fantasy. 

The lack of space is obvious, even with Harry’s back pressed against the wall, there’s not much room for Louis to kneel. Once they get situated, Louis starts by licking up the length of Harry’s half hard cock. When Louis takes Harry into his mouth, Harry’s foot slips and he nearly falls over. He reaches out for balance and knocks all of the bottles off the shelf. Louis groans and puts his head against Harry’s thigh. “I don’t think this is gonna work. I’ll give you an IOU for later.” 

Harry helps Louis stand and they attempt to finish their shared shower. There’s not much space even with Louis standing, and Harry’s hard on keeps rubbing against his crack as they wash up. It’s very distracting. Louis rinses shampoo from his hair. Harry reaches for the shower gel. He smacks his elbow on the glass door as he reaches for the soap and they both groan at the pain shooting up their arms. The pain effectively kills the mood.

They rinse off and hop out of the shower. Harry grabs two towels, handing one to Louis to dry off. Louis wraps the towel around his waist and heads into the bedroom to find some clean clothes. Harry is stood in front of the mirrored dresser in Louis’ room. Louis watches as Harry towels off his hair and roll it up into a small bun. It’s insanely hot. Louis kisses the exposed nape of Harry’s neck and places his hands around his waist as he steps around him to get to his suitcase on the floor.

Once Louis is dressed, Harry returns from his room dressed in a grey hoodie and yellow gym shorts. Louis is dressed similarly, in grey joggers and an oversized red hoodie.

They scrounge together whatever they can find for dinner. The cupboards and fridge are nearly bare as they have been trying to eat up the last of the food so they don’t have to haul it back to LA. They end up cooking the last two salmon fillets from the freezer and some canned peas. It turns out alright. 

After dinner they head out to the front porch. Louis is watching a pair of grey squirrels run around the yard and up a tree. At one point, a deer walks through the woods, just a meter from the edge of the garden. Louis silently points out the buck and they watch him trot gracefully through the trees. Harry and Louis chat about this and that, nothing of substance, but it’s good company. They watch the sunset through the trees and listen as the songbirds quiet down and make way for the crickets and owls. 

Louis starts to shiver. He wraps his arms tighter around his middle to retain some body heat.

“Hey, let’s go inside.” Harry suggests.

Louis follows him into the cabin. Louis decides to light a fire in the wood stove to keep the chill out of the cabin. As he’s loading in some wood, Harry sets up yet another John Wayne movie in the VHS player. They watched the last rom com a week ago, to Harry’s dismay, but there’s still about a dozen westerns that they have yet to watch. 

“We have to wait for this one to rewind.” Harry says. He grabs the remote and heads to the couch. 

“I guess it’s better than watching Netflix when it buffers.” Louis says. Even from across the room, Louis can hear the quiet whir of the machine as it rewinds the tape. They are lucky the player hasn’t worn out from their constant use. It hasn’t been used much in the past ten years.

Louis joins Harry on the couch. He lays his legs over Harry’s which are stretched out on the coffee table. “What did you pick out?”

“It’s called _North to Alaska_. It said it’s about the Alaskan gold rush.”

“Alright, sounds interesting enough.” Louis says. He grabs the blanket off the back of the couch and covers their legs. 

The VHS player clicks loudly as the tape stops rewinding. Harry presses play on the remote and the blue screen goes black. 

The movie is different than most of the other westerns they’d watched so far, and it’s interesting enough to draw them in. But like most of the other westerns, this film too is a product of its time, as some of the writing hasn’t aged well.

Despite some of the problematic bits, it’s an enjoyable enough movie. Harry and Louis spend most of the time joking about the silly scenes and cringing at the dated dialogue. When someone gets knocked out to the sound of birds chirping they both double over in laughter.

“Oh my god, that’s bad.” Louis wipes tears from his eyes after laughing so hard. Louis has been enjoying watching these old movies. It’s impressive to see how far his field of work has advanced with the improvements of cameras and editing. Fight scenes have come a long way.

“Oh, so you haven’t used that in a fight scene?” Harry teases.

“I can honestly say I haven’t.”

“Come on, it’s a Hollywood standard. All the best blockbusters use bird sounds to make their fight scenes more realistic.”

“You little shit.” Louis tickles Harry under his ribs until Harry begs for mercy. He relents and plants a quick kiss on the corner of Harry’s mouth before turning back to the movie.

The movie ends and the screen fades to black. “Do you want to watch another one?” Harry asks. 

“Sure.” Harry removes himself from Louis’ arms. Sometime during the last hour they’d shifted onto their sides and Louis was spooning Harry. Harry flicks on the lamp so he can see as he goes to change out the tapes. He grabs another movie from the shelf, reads the back, then puts it back. Two more get put back before he finally pops one in. 

Harry returns to the couch and rearranges himself in Louis’ arms as the opening credits roll. He feels the shifting of Harry’s muscles as he settles in beside him. He doesn’t catch the title of this movie, but he doesn’t really care. His mind has taken off on an anxious spiral, through all the usual stresses of work, the training schedules and scripted scenes, the difficulties that he anticipates when they start filming. 

After about ten minutes, Louis still can’t bring himself to care about the story on the screen. He’s been thinking about anything and everything while he’s been tracing the ink on Harry’s arm. It’s a calming motion but it doesn’t calm him. Harry seems to like it though, so he continues. His thoughts drift further, to the weird connection with Harry that they still don’t understand. 

He should be enjoying his Friday night instead of stressing. Louis sighs.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Harry asks softly. He turns his face toward Louis.

“I’m just stressing. It’s fine.”

“You can talk about it if you want.” Harry says. Louis considers the offer. He doesn’t even know where to begin. Usually when he gets stressed he’d pull out his tupperware, roll a joint, and relax into his high. 

“I wish we had some weed. It’d be nice to destress after the strange week we’ve had.” 

“I have some.”

“And you didn’t share?” Louis swats at him playfully.

“Yeah, sorry. I had some that night I stormed out of training and then I went for a swim. You were asleep when I got back.”

“A swim? Where?”

“In the pond.”

“What pond?”

“Oh my god! The pond!” Harry sits upright suddenly.

“What are you talking about?” Louis shuffles to sit as well. He has no clue what’s gotten into Harry. 

Harry starts rambling, words rushing out faster than he usually talks. It takes everything in Louis to follow his thoughts.

“There’s a pond. It’s in the forest. I took a walk and followed it a ways. Then, I could hear a stream so I followed the sound. When I found the stream I followed that to the pond. It’s not very far.

“I went for a swim. And, while I was in the water, everything started glowing. I thought it was just a hallucination, like maybe there was something extra in the weed. But that was before all of this…” Harry waves his hands broadly between them. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that sooner.”

“I didn’t know there was a pond.” Louis says obtusely. He is not sure what else to say. It sounds crazy. But what part of their ordeal hasn’t sounded impossibly insane. If it was just a bad trip on Harry’s end, then they are still no closer to figuring this out than they were before. But it also might be closer to finding answers than they have been all week. And maybe, just maybe, there might be a way to cut their weird connection if they return to the pond.

“Alright, lead the way.” Louis jumps up from the couch and walks over to the door, pulling on his shoes.

“Now?”

“Yes, now. I want to see the pond.”

“But it was earlier last time. And there was a full moon. It’s a lot darker tonight.” Harry points indignantly out the small window in the living room as he gets off the couch. 

Louis huffs and starts digging through one of the drawers in the kitchen. He pulls out a huge metal torch that looks straight out of an army surplus store. He clicks it on and miraculously turns on with a bright yellow beam of light illuminating the wall in front of him.

As soon as Harry slips on his shoes Louis says, “Let’s go.” He reaches for Harry. He wraps his hand around his wrist and drags him out the door. 

“Fine. But just for the record, I think this is a bad idea. The pond will still be there in the morning when it’s light out.” They cross the dark garden and Harry stops when he reaches the break in the fence, where the path leads into the forest. 

Louis shivers as they stand in the opening. His jumper is not enough to block out the cool fall air. He thrusts the torch into Harry’s hand. “Lead the way.” 

It is difficult to walk through the brush and under the tree limbs, but Louis manages. He listens as Harry describes the weird light, explaining how everything was glowing and then the light disappeared in a flash. It sounds straight out of the Twilight Zone, but Louis keeps his thoughts to himself.

“Shh. Can you hear that?” Harry stops to listen closer without the competing sound of their footfalls. There is a quiet bubbling sound, like a trickle of water. “The stream is over there.” Harry points the beam of the torch to the right. They veer off the path, walking perpendicular to it as Harry fans the light in front of them. The sound gets louder. Finally they see the stream. The light of the torch shimmers off the surface of the water, highlighting the ripples where it cascades over smooth rocks. They turn to follow the stream down the hill. 

“Not much farther now.” Harry says.

And he’s right. A few meters more and the trees begin to thin out and Louis can see the pond through the branches. It’s very dark, but the inky black water stands out. “I can see it!” Louis exclaims. Louis had no idea this pond even existed, despite coming to the cabin every summer for years. 

“Come on, it gets a bit steep at the last bit.” Harry warns as he begins the nearly three meter incline down to the pond. He goes slow, his foot only slipping on a loose rock once. He’s quick to recover his balance. When he reaches the bottom he turns the torch back to the incline to help Louis down.

Louis watches his footing as he makes his way down the nearly vertical incline. When he reaches the bottom he releases a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. There is about a meter of shore before the land gives way to the black water of the pond.

As he steps away from the treeline, Louis is astonished to find a perfectly unobstructed view of the night sky. It reminds him of the time years ago when his mother took him and his siblings to an indoor planetarium. Except that this isn’t a projection, they’re really are millions of stars above him. “Woah.”

“It’s even better than last time!” Harry exclaims in a whisper, as if a loud voice might scare off the stars. “There’s so many more stars without the moon.”

“This is incredible.” Louis says. They both stand stargazing for a moment, absorbing the unobstructed beauty.Finally Louis breaks the silence. “So how did you make it glow?”

“Well, I was swimming in the pond when it happened, so I assume we should get in the water?” Harry says apprehensively.

“Okay.” Louis removes his shoes and takes off his jumper. 

When Louis turns toward the pond, Harry adds, “I was skinny dipping. I don’t know if it matters, but if we are going to recreate whatever happened, we should probably be accurate.”

“Alright.” Louis unabashedly strips off his joggers and pants leaving them in a pile next to his discarded jumper and shoes. Then he takes off running toward the water. The night air is cool, but the water has retained the heat from the summer and it feels amazing as he submerges himself in the pond.

Nothing happens.

Behind him, Harry has stripped naked and is entering the water, less splashy than Louis as he wades out to waist deep water. Louis takes in his surroundings. It’s very beautiful, but nothing is glowing.

They float around for a bit, chatting and kicking around. Still nothing happens. 

“So, the pond isn’t glowing.” Louis addresses the elephant in the room.

“Maybe it was just the time of day. I think the sun was setting and maybe the angle of the sunlight caused it.” Harry hypothesizes. “It’s just, it was so sudden and I don’t really know what happened.”

“It’s alright. Maybe you’re right and it was a particular time that caused it. Or you really were trippin’ balls and the weird connection is completely unrelated.” Louis laughs, attempting to mask his disappointment with humor.

“Hey!” Harry splashes a handful of water toward Louis. Unsuspecting, Louis gets a facefull of water.

“Oh, you’re going to regret that!” Louis goes into attack mode, doubling back and splashing Harry with more water. It ignites a splash war, both swimming around and dodging splashes from the other. Their laughter bounces around the little cove. The playful attacks intensify and Louis needs to get an upper hand to win. He ducks under the water, swimming under the surface to pop up behind Harry. He pushes off the bottom of the bond and breaks through the surface. Harry tries to swim away. He is quick, but not quick enough. Louis reaches out and grabs his ankle to restrain him and pull him back.

The instant his hand wraps around Harry’s ankle, it feels as if a spark surges through Louis’ veins. It zips up his arms and down his spine. He gasps and lets go of Harry’s ankle and watches in awe as the water around them starts to glow. The light intensifies, radiating around them and spreading outward toward the shore. Within seconds, there is enough glowing teal light in the pond to illuminate the entire cove.

“Lou!” Harry whispers, swimming back to him. “It’s happening!” He sounds hesitant, as if he’s waiting for Louis to confirm he too can see the change.

“Unbelievable.” Louis whispers in awe.

Louis grips on to Harry’s arm, unconsciously needing something to ground him as the surreal light shines impossibly from the pond they are in.

“So what happens now?” Louis asks.

“I’m not sure. Last time it just disappeared after a bit.”

“Are we just supposed to float around in this magical pond and hope that it is breaking whatever weird spell it set? How do we know if it’s working?”

“I know as much as you do, Lou. We’ll figure it out as we go. For now let’s just enjoy a swim in this beautiful glowing water.” 

“Alright.” 

Louis paddles around the pond. Every so often he stretches out his leg, kicking off the bottom of the pond to keep himself afloat. When he completes one lap, he returns to the center, where Harry is stretched out in a backfloat. His naked form is suspended, just under the surface, highlighting the contours of his body in an ethereal light. His face is the only part fully out of the water and his hair fans out in a glowing halo. His eyes are closed and Louis takes a moment to admire how peaceful he looks. Harry must feel Louis’s stare, and he opens his eyes. A soft smile pulls at his lips.

Louis joins him, lifting his legs and trusting the weight of the water to support him. With his ears under the surface, the world is quiet. He reaches out to grab Harry’s hand. Their fingers slot together and they float side by side. Time falling away as they look up at the stars. Despite the intense glow of the water, the light emanating from the pond doesn’t extend past the treetops, and the magnificence of the night sky remains overhead. 

“It’s a bit more green than I remember it.” Harry whispers. “Kinda like a turquoise now. I wonder why it changed color.”

“Maybe you’re just remembering it wrong.” 

“No, I remember. It was the color of your eyes.” Immediately after Harry says that, he ducks his head under water and swims away. 

Louis feels a wave of embarrassment wash over him and his chest burns. Yet it is a detached feeling and he knows he is not embarrassed. He’s bemused by Harry’s candid admission, but not embarrassed. Louis doesn’t think too much of it. Maybe whatever is causing the water to glow is distorting his emotions or something. As they’ve discovered this magic works in mysterious ways.

“That was quite the line,” Louis jokes once Harry reemerges. “Oh, you think my eyes are beautiful? Do you want to stare into them all day?” He wades closer to Harry with each line and doesn’t relent on the teasing. 

“Nooo,” Harry whines.

“Next, you’re going to tell me they’re the color of the ocean?”

“Stop!” Harry laughs, splashing a small handful of water towards him. 

“That it’s like staring into a wishing well? That you could get lost in them? You’re going to have to try harder than that. I’ve heard them all before.” 

Harry goes to splash him again, but Louis grabs Harry’s wrists to prevent it. When he stops fighting to get loose, Louis relaxes his grip, but continues to hold his wrists at his side. Harry relaxes into the soft restraint. Louis admires Harry as they bob in the water, their feet barely touching the bottom. There is an electricity in the space between their bodies and only their hands are touching. He feels a thrill at being able to subdue Harry so easily and wonders if it would be possible to take it further. Louis’ thoughts drift to silk ties, coarse ropes, and leather cuffs and his blood rushes south. Before he works himself up too much with fantasies of Harry tied to a bed, Harry breaks the silence.

“It wasn’t a line.” Harry murmurs meekly.

“No? You didn’t say that just to get in my pants?” Louis taunts, raising his eyebrows.

“I don’t need a line to get you.” Harry breaks his hands out of the hold with a bit of unexpected force. He places his freed hands around Louis’ waist. His meekness was merely a ruse so Louis would drop his guard. Harry drags their bodies together and slots his thigh between Louis legs. “And besides, if I were to use a line on you, I’d compliment your arse, not your eyes.” Harry slides his hands down, grasping Louis’ arse and pulls him closer, grinding into him.

Louis moans, instantly aroused by the unexpected reversal of power and the press of a thigh between his legs. This cocky, assertive version of Harry is unexpected but not unwanted. 

Harry captures his mouth in a heated kiss. His tongue teases the part of Louis’ lips. Louis opens for him and is consumed by the desire. Harry pulls him closer. He rocks his hips onto Harry’s thigh, the water sloshing between them. He’s surrounded by slick skin and heated flesh but can’t seem to get close enough. He’s plagued with the need for more. Louis pulls back, breathless from the kiss.

The change is gradual, not noticeable at first. As Harry continues to suck a love bite into Louis’ neck, just below his ear, the light from the pond dims. Louis blinks, unsure if his eyes are tricking him. The leaves of the trees return to the shadows as the glow begins to retreat.

“Harry, look.” Louis says. Harry lifts his head from Louis’ neck. Louis gasps as he watches the light pull back from the shore. 

“It’s just like before.” Harry says. They stay wrapped around each other as the light recedes further. The blue glow intensifies as it converges around them. Louis squints into the brightness, barely able to see shore through the glare. He grips onto Harry’s arm harder, likely leaving bruises in place of his fingertips. The glow had been beautiful before, but this is alarming. Before he can voice his concern to Harry, the glow pulses, one bright white flash, before extinguishing into nothing. 

The sudden darkness around them is disorienting. 

“Woah.” Louis says as he knocks into Harry. The flash of light left him with spots in his vision, as if he had been staring at the sun. 

“That was wild. It was more intense than I remembered.” Harry says, blinking rapidly. “I can hardly see.”

“Same.” Louis laughs nervously. He wipes a hand over his eyes. 

It takes a few minutes for his eyes to equilibrate, so he and Harry just stand in chest deep water, wrapped in each other.

After a few minutes, the spots in his eyes finally subside. With only the stars left shining above, Louis can’t see much beyond Harry. He can only make out some outlines of trees and the edge of the water. It’s dark, but at least he isn’t seeing spots anymore.

“Are you ready to head back?” Louis asks.

“Yeah, we should start heading back. I’m getting all shriveled anyway.” Harry stares at his fingers, the tips wrinkled from their time in the water.

“Well, that’s too bad. I don’t have much use for a shriveled dick.” Louis laughs maniacally.

“No, my fingertips! Why would you think that?” Harry groans.

They wade out of the pond. Louis shivers as the cooler air surrounds him. He quickly pulls on his clothes over his wet skin to ward off the cold. It’s uncomfortable, but they forgot to bring towels. 

They hike back to the cabin. Harry leads them with the torch lighting their path. Louis follows close behind. The hike back uphill in the dark is slow, but soon enough the cabin is in view. The warmth of the wood stove greets them as they stumble through the door. 

They both take rushed showers in their own bathrooms to rinse the pond water. Louis turns the water hotter, warming himself after being outside in the cold. Louis hops out and dries himself quickly, then hangs the towel back up on the hook. Without bothering to dress, he tiptoes lightly down the hall to Harry’s room and lays himself out on the bed, posing toward the door. 

He doesn’t have to wait long before a towel-clad Harry walks in. Louis enjoys the way Harry’s jaw drops in shock at the surprise. 

“Come here.” Louis says when Harry doesn’t move from the doorway.

Harry drops the towel from his waist and climbs onto the bed. He hovers over Louis, staring into his eyes.

“I thought you didn’t want my shriveled dick?” Harry jokes.

“There’s nothing shriveled about it.” Louis reaches between them and grasps Harry’s half hard cock. The impressive girth fits well in his palm. Harry moans as he pulls his dry hand up the length. Louis cranes his neck off the bed, searching for Harry’s lips. They make out, heat building between them, until Louis grows impatient. He breaks from a kiss and taps on Harry’s hip to get his full attention.

“Grab the lube.” Louis commands.

Harry scrambles over to the edge of the bed. He had moved the lube and condoms to the side table. When he turns back to Louis, he tackles Harry to the mattress, then swings a leg over his middle. He settles his weight firmly on his chest and resumes their kissing. While he has Harry thoroughly distracted he reaches for the lube that had fallen onto the mattress. He skillfully uses one hand to pop the cap of the little bottle and then gets some onto his hand. It’s a bit messy, but it’s worth it when Harry doesn’t notice. He reaches behind himself and quickly adds the first finger. The awkward angle of his arm gives him away and Harry finally breaks from their sloppy kisses to see what Louis is doing. 

Harry groans and drops his head back to the pillow. “You’re gonna be the death of me.” 

Louis returns to kissing Harry as he adds a second, then a third in short order. When he’s prepped enough, he removes his fingers and sits back a bit. The wetness between his legs settles onto Harry’s stomach and Harry groans again. He places his hands on Louis’ waist and then moves his right hand back, feeling at the wetness smeared around his hole. Louis lets Harry explore with gentle fingers while he grabs for the condom and the bottle of lube. It’s much easier when he can use both hands. He slips on the condom and coats Harry’s cock with lube. Harry arches into his touch, nearly unseating Louis. Louis catches himself on Harry’s shoulders. 

Louis lifts himself up and grips Harry’s length. He sinks down slowly, enjoying the burn as he is filled. Harry’s hands come up to his hips again, holding him softly as if he’s unsure he’s allowed. Louis takes a moment to adjust before he rolls his hips incrementally. 

“Shit, feels amazing.” Louis says as he rolls his hips deeper. It’s overwhelming, but Louis takes his time. He draws out his pleasure because he knows it drives Harry mad. 

Harry’s hands tighten around his hips, but that just won’t do. Louis growls deep in his throat. He grabs Harry’s hands and pulls them over his head on the mattress. Harry’s eyes go dark and Louis feels the intensity behind his stare. He laces their fingers together and leans his weight forward. The change in angle is amazing, not as deep but his cock nudges at his spot with every roll of his hips. 

It’s slow and sensual, not frantic like the other times. A warmth builds in his chest and he feels so close to Harry. 

When he starts to tire out, Harry plants his feet and begins to thrust up from below. A heat builds in Louis. Every thrust, every roll of his hips stokes the embers into a raging fire.

“I’m close.” Harry whines. 

“Me too.” Louis releases one of his hands, in favor of pulling himself off. Harry’s hand knocks his away. Harry’s palm surrounds his cock and he pulls him off in time with his thrusts. Louis comes, spilling over Harry’s fist and stomach and Harry continues to thrust, working him through his orgasm. 

Harry comes just seconds later, thrusting deep and spilling into the condom as he cries out Louis’ name. 

Louis’ arms give out and he collapses onto Harry’s chest, but he quickly becomes too sensitive. He pulls off and heads to the bathroom to discard the condom. He cleans himself up quickly then grabs a wash rag for Harry. He nearly chokes when he finds Harry licking his hand clean instead.

“You are too much.” Louis groans. He tosses the rag at Harry.

“Does that make you one much?” Harry asks. 

“Maybe…” Louis shakes his head, a soft smile spreading. He’s so endeared by Harry’s antics.

Harry yawns and Louis realises that it is getting late. The bed is a disaster and he doesn’t have the energy to change out sheets. Luckily it doesn’t take any convincing to drag Harry down the hall to Louis’ own clean bed. The fall beneath the sheets wrapped up in each other. Louis tucks Harry into his arms and sleepily traces the anchor on his wrist as he falls into a dreamless sleep.

\- - -

Louis wakes up tangled in Harry. Despite the drawn curtain, light is pouring in through the thin old material. Harry is plastered to Louis’ side, head tucked under his chin and long arms wrapped tight around his middle. Louis is overheated under the furnace of Harry’s skin and he has to pee. He extracts himself and sits up on the bed, wiping the sleep from his eyes. Harry groans, still fighting to stay asleep.

Louis checks his phone and groans when he realises that it is well past noon. He traipses to the bathroom and when he returns, Harry has curled himself around Louis’ abandoned pillow. Louis sits on the bed and coaxes him awake with gentle touches, rubbing his arm and pushing the stray curls from his forehead. When he still refuses to open his eyes.

“Harry, it’s time to get up.” Louis whispers.

“Ngh.” Harry groans into the pillow.

“No, come on. Get up. It’s past noon already.” Louis pushes at his bare shoulder to rouse him.

Harry turns his head and cracks one eye, glaring at Louis. “It’s our day off, can’t we stay in bed?” 

Louis feels reluctance tugging at him. It’s a grey cloud of heavy limbs and tiredness fighting to draw him back into bed. It’s almost strong enough to convince him, but Louis shakes off the feeling, knowing that he needs to focus on work. “I was hoping to get in a bit of practice today. We’ve already lost some time from trying to figure out this connection and are a bit behind on the schedule.”

“Ugh. Fine.” Harry rolls over, the sheet falling away to expose his nakedness unabashedly as he pries himself from the bed. 

Louis heads to the kitchen to start on breakfast while Harry gets dressed. He pulls out the carton of eggs and is cracking them into a bowl.

“Ow! Damnit!” Harry shouts from in his bedroom.

“What happened?” Louis calls down the hall.

“Don’t you feel that? Hurts like a mother.” Harry hisses.

“Feel what?” 

“Just stubbed my damn toe on the bed frame.” Harry says. 

“No. Oh my god, I didn’t feel it!” Louis gets excited. “Harry, I didn’t feel it!” 

Harry comes rushing down the hall, tugging a shirt over his head as he walks. A shiver runs up Louis’ spine. “Do you think we fixed it? That we broke the spell in the pond?”

“Maybe.” Louis says hesitantly. He wants to be excited about this, but he isn’t sure that they have all the answers.

“Aren’t you happy about this Louis? You won’t have to feel everytime I hurt my clumsy arse?”

“I am. But wasn’t that too easy? Like, we just hopped back in the water and it reversed everything. No questions asked?”

“Yeah, I see your point.” Harry rubs at his chin. A wave of disappointment floods Louis’ mind. “Well, at least it’s over, even if we don’t know what it was.”

“Right. And we can still talk to Stevie. She said she’d call back today. Maybe she has found something.” Louis shrugs and returns to making their eggs. “It would be interesting to know what it was, even if it’s gone now.”

Harry seems relieved to be rid of the connection so easily. Will he be just as relieved to rid himself of Louis when they go back to LA? Louis is praying that Stevie can give them some answers. He needs to know what caused the connection, and how much it manipulated their emotions. It might help clue Louis in on his relationship with Harry. Louis hates to think their relationship was dependent on the spell, but it’s hard to know if any of his emotions are true.

It’s after nine o’clock that night when Stevie finally calls. Harry rushes out to the porch to answer the phone. He puts it on speaker, and they exchange greetings.

“Sorry it’s so late.” Stevie apologizes. “I’ve had a busy few days leading up to the New Moon.”

“That’s alright, Stevie. So what did you find out?” Harry asks.

“I did some digging over the past few days. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find anything more on your situation. It could be a really specific form of magic. But, I was able to contact the coven in your area. They might be able to help you out. I spoke with one of the people and explained what is going on so that they can get started on their research. Horan offered to meet with you both at three pm on Sunday, if you’re able.”

“That’s great! Thanks Stevie. We’ll be there.” Harry says.

“Okay, I’ll let them know to expect you.” She says. Then she rattles off the address and wishes them luck before ending the call. 

The call was so short that Louis hadn’t even thought to tell her about their trip to the pond or that they might have broken the spell all on their own. A nervous energy overcomes Louis. Hopefully that won’t matter. They are so close to getting answers now, anyway.


	11. Chapter 11

The sun is already high overhead when they hop into the car. Harry drives them toward their destination while Louis navigates them through the winding roads. Last night after Stevie’s call, they were lucky to get enough service for the maps app on Louis’ phone to load. They searched for the address and were surprised to find that it is only thirty minutes east of the cabin. Harry had copied down the directions onto a sheet of notebook paper. 

The ride is mostly silent, save for Louis’ playlist filling the void through the aux cord. They’re both anxious about meeting with this person that might know what actually happened between them. Harry feels twitchy and uncertain. His palms are sweaty and he’s sure his stomach is about to jump out of his throat. He can’t pinpoint why he’s having such a nervous reaction. He should not be this nervous about meeting someone new, even if it is a witch. He knows better than to judge people by their beliefs or practices. Hell, he hasn’t ever been this nervous when he’s met other witches.

Stevie, of course, had been the first witch he’d met, though he hadn’t learned that until years after they’d become friends. She owns a little eccentric bookshop cafe that he’d found when he’d first moved to LA. 

He was drawn in by the posters for an open mic night. But that was right before his audition for _Night Changes_. He’d been only sixteen and was too nervous to take the stage himself. By the time he was older and more confident, he’d stopped singing altogether. 

Harry still loved visiting her shop when he had time to spare, even if it wasn’t to take the little stage in the back. The bookshop was a place he could sit in anonymity for hours, as most of her patrons didn’t recognize him. Over the years he’d struck up an unexpected friendship with Stevie and she’d introduced him to a few of her friends. But he’s never met another witch without her presence to mediate. At least she’d called ahead to make their introductions with this new witch. 

They continue driving up the same stretch of road for another ten minutes before Louis breaks the silence. “Turn right up here.” 

Harry slows the car and signals his turn, then turns off the paved street onto a narrow gravel road. Rocks crunch under the tires, drowning out the sound of the music in the car. The road is very narrow and gradually winds its way uphill. Dense trees on either side cast the road in shade, limiting the view of any possible driveways. Louis leans forward focusing in on the road up ahead and scouting out where the trees break away for a driveway. 

“It should be coming up soon.” Louis says, reviewing the directions held tightly in his hand. Harry slows down. 

They drive for five more minutes before Louis says, “I think that’s it.” He points at a small break in the trees, unmarked except for one house number sign that is barely legible from the road. “Never mind. That’s 13424. Should be the next one down.” Harry rolls ahead, slower now so they can watch out for the addresses. 

“There.” Louis points . A beam of sunlight is filtering through a patch of trees and highlights the driveway perfectly. The house number is clearly visible from the roadside, indicating that they have indeed found 13428 Pinewood Road. 

Harry turns into the drive. The driveway is much wider than the last, and better manicured than the others, with the grass and brush surrounding trimmed back. Just a meter off the road, an archway brackets the entrance announcing their arrival to Horan Goat Farm. They drive up the long drive until a barn, and then a farmhouse become visible. Harry parks and takes a look around, noticing that there are actually several barns and a chicken coop in the clearing. It’s a much larger farm than it appeared to be from the road. 

They get out of the car and the sound of their car doors shutting echoes through the farm. 

“In here!” A masculine voice calls from the closest barn, where a door is open. 

Louis glances back to Harry. Harry shrugs, and they both walk toward the barn. Inside, they find a farmer in a flannel shirt and dirtied overalls. He looks to be around their age, not more than thirty. He is wrangling a white goat up to a raised platform. He grunts as the goat stubbornly refuses to move, bleating loudly back its refusal to cooperate. 

Finally, the farmer gets the goat where he needs it and ties it in place on the platform. Satisfied that it is no longer being moved, the goat quiets down. 

“How can I help you two?”

“Hi, I’m Harry Styles, and this is Louis Tomlinson.” Harry introduces. “We’re friends of Stevie. She said she’d called ahead.” 

“Yes, ah, it’s already three then? Sorry. This is taking longer than I planned. The goats were being extra stubborn today. Do you mind if I finish up ol’ Elvira here. She’s the last one.”

“No, go ahead.” Harry nods. He is surprised to hear an Irish accent, but he takes it in stride. 

They watch as Niall picks up a pair of hoof trimmer and struggles to capture the back leg of the goat. Elvira kicks and bleats, fighting back. When Niall finally gets ahold of the leg and it stops moving, he begins to trim away the hoof. He repeats with all four hooves. Then he unties Elvira and leads her back to the pen.

“Sorry ‘bout that.” The farmer says, coming back from the pen. Harry catches his eyes drift slowly over himself and then Louis, before he snaps his head back to Harry. When his gaze suddenly meets Harry’s, his eyes widen. Harry rubs at his bare arms, trying to shake off exposed feeling left by the farmer’s gaze. The farmer coughs lightly in an attempt to disperse the awkwardness of getting caught checking them out. 

The farmer offers a small wave toward them both. “Hi, I’m Niall Horan. I’d shake your hands, but there’s no telling what these goat hooves get into.” He laughs. Harry glances down at Niall’s bare hands, where the layers of dirt obscure the true color of his skin. Then he points toward the open barn door. “Let’s head inside.” 

Niall leads them to the farmhouse and into the kitchen. After washing his hands, he offers to brew some tea and they both agree. Niall makes pleasant small talk, asking about their drive up and talking about the recent weather. 

Harry looks around the kitchen, surveying the setting while Niall has his back turned. It looks more likely to be a grandparents’ house than that of a twenty-something probable-bachelor. From his seat at the old kitchen table, he can see a narrow staircase that leads to the second floor and a small living room in the next room. There is old furniture and dated decor surrounding a massive brick fireplace. There’s black and white family portraits hung on the far wall. The decor of the kitchen is also dated. There are yellowing lace curtains framing the window above the kitchen sink and the floral cushions on the kitchen chairs have seen better days. Most surprising, though, is a painted wood sign hung above the back door. It reads “Remember the Great Goat Rush of 1949”. 

“What was the Great Goat Rush of 1949?” Harry asks, not able to restrain his curiosity.

Niall barks out a brassy laugh. “Oh, that’s a good story.” 

Niall brings over three mugs and takes a seat across from Louis and Harry. As they all take turns fixing their mugs of tea, Niall begins his story.

“My great grandparents immigrated to California in 1949. He was going on 45 and just lost his job at the shipyard. They’d brought the two youngest children with, but my grandfather and his two older brothers had already left home by then and stayed in Ireland.

“They didn’t have much when they arrived, but my great grandfather was resourceful. He bartered with one of the neighbors for a pair of goats during their first year in California. They started producing goat milk and cheese and selling it in town, and expanded the farm. And it kept expanding until we were one of the largest goat farms in the region. 

Even though our family was one of the few to cash in on the California goat industry, Grandad James always referred to it as The Great Goat Rush of 1949.”

Harry barks out a laugh at the pun. “That’s brilliant.”

“Grandad would be glad you think so. Most of the family was not so amused by his humor.” Niall says. 

“So how’d you end up here if your grandfather was still in Ireland?” Louis asks. “If you don’t mind me asking.” He adds on for tact.

“Well, most of the family spread out around the country as they grew up, but my aunt stayed and she took over the farm in 1983. When she got sick a few years ago, no one else in the family was willing to come back to the farm. So they reached out to us still in Ireland. I was taking a gap year before uni and didn’t have a clue what I wanted to do, so I offered to take over.” Niall pauses in thought, his eyes unfocused. He slowly takes a sip of his tea before resuming his story. 

“Aunt Eileen taught me everything about the goats and the farm in the time she had left. She passed away a few years ago, leaving the Horan Goat Farm to me.” The room is quiet when he stops talking, the weight of his grief more palpable in the room. Niall quickly shakes it off and lightens the mood.

“That was a long tangent I’m sure you weren’t expecting. Anyway let’s get down to business. What brings you here?”

“We came to talk to Stevie’s friend about a problem we’ve been having.” Louis says.

“Of course. She explained your situation over the phone. I can say, it’s got me a bit stumped.” Niall huffs.

“Wait, you’re the witch?” Louis balks. Niall stares at Louis after his outburst. Astonishment floods through Harry, a strong shock of confusion morphs into a hesitant acceptance.

These emotions feel out of place in Harry’s mind and he is discomforted by the intensity of his astonishment. He has seen people of all kinds come to Stevie for advice or supplies. He pushes out the hesitancy and adjusts his thinking. He trusts Stevie, so Niall must be good if she sent them here.

“Yes, that’s me. were you expecting green skin and warts or something?” Niall snipes. He folds his arms in front of him and cocks his head to the side, waiting for Louis’ reply.

“No, no, sorry. It’s just you’re…” Louis flails his hands as he tries to phrase his thoughts. His sentence trails off when he can’t think of what to say. He seems to be having a hard time accepting the inverse of the stereotype. 

“A man? Yeah. That’s not always the case. Anyone can practice.” Niall reprimands lightly.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to assume.” Louis apologizes sincerely. 

“It’s alright. I get it.” Niall laughs. “I wasn’t always a witch and I didn’t set out to become one. It just kinda happened.” Niall shrugs and finishes the last of his tea. 

“What do you mean?” Harry asks, intrigued by Niall’s admission. 

“Aunt Eileen was a member of the local coven. The coven dissolved years ago because of a lack of interest from the younger generations. But, she passed on what she knew to me. It’s mostly protection spells and herbal remedies. I use it to protect the farm and keep the goats healthy.”

“Oh, so you don’t know about love spells.” Harry says, disappointment coloring his tone. 

“I didn’t. But lucky for you, Aunt Eileen kept a bunch of the grimoires from the coven. Actually, I can show you what I’ve found so far. Let me grab some of the books and notes I’ve been going over.” Niall goes into the living room and comes back moments later, arms piled high with an assortment of books. The various sized books are all leather-bound in shades of brown, black, and red. 

“I started with what Stevie told be of your situation and I’ve been looking for any similar elements. But it’s slow research. I have decades worth of material to pour over, and a good portion of it is written in Latin.”

“Actually, we have some updates for you. We didn’t get a chance to share the news with Stevie, but we think we’ve broken whatever spell there was.” Harry says excitedly. Niall’s head snaps up suddenly. His jaw drops open and he looks confused. 

“Yeah, I can’t feel what Harry feels anymore. So we don’t need to break the spell, but we are curious about what it was that caused it.” Louis chimes in. 

“Did it just stop happening or did you try something?” Niall asks, donning a very studious look. He extracts a legal pad from between two of the books. He uncaps a blue pen and take notes as Louis animatedly describes the situation.

“So, Friday night, Harry remembered he had been swimming in a pond and it had been glowing. He didn’t think anything of weird glowy water. Can you believe?” 

“What do you mean by glowing?” Niall asks, looking up from his paper to Harry.

“It was like a blue light.” Harry talks carefully, measuring out his words. He twists at the ring around his middle finger as he continues. “It was kind of like those underground pools with colored lights, except that the light was coming from the whole pond, not just a lightbulb. It stayed glowing for a while, but then it disappeared with a bright flash around me. It was a weird experience.” 

“Uh huh.” Niall writes down a few things and Louis picks up his story where he’d left off.

“I guessed that if the glowing pond caused this connection, we might be able to reverse it by returning. So, I made Harry take me to the pond. While we were swimming it started glowing, just like Harry said. Then, the next morning, the connection was gone.” Louis shrugs and leans back in his chair. Harry runs his fingers through his hair and flips it toward the back. He waits for Niall to comment on their outlandish tale. 

Niall scribbles some more notes. He circles one of the words at the top. Then he flips through a few previous pages and hums as he reads through them. “Interesting…”

“So do you know what has been going on?” Harry asks, afraid that if Niall can’t figure this out, they may never know what had caused the connection.

“I’m not certain, but I have some leads.” Niall stacks the grimoires to the side, clearing space on the table in front of him.

“Let’s see them.” Louis says, impatient to learn their fate.

Niall pulls a grimoire from the stack. It is red leather and looks rather new compared to most of the others. He opens it to a bookmarked page. Louis and Harry lean in closer to see. Faded ink shows a rough drawing of a map. Properties are marked and labeled with family names in the margins. 

“This is a map of the coven territories, probably from the sixties. It’s the most recent I could find of the area. We are here.” Niall points at the top right corner to a little house shaped icon. A line connects it to “Horan” scrawled in careful calligraphy. Then he slides his finger to the middle of the left page. “This is your cabin, right?”

Louis criticizes the image closer, leaning in to follow the crudely drawn roads and landmarks. There is no family name attached to the little house. But there is a puddle of dark ink just to the left in the exact shape of the pond. 

“Yeah, I think so.” Louis says. 

“That must be the pond.” Harry points out to confirm. 

“Oh yeah, that must be it.” Louis says, certainty brightening his voice.

“Your cabin is in the middle of a region that was once heavily populated by witches.” Niall points to a few properties around the cabin that are linked to names. “It’s highly likely that there are old spells and traces of rituals littered throughout the whole area.” Niall says. A hint of concern turning the corners of his mouth down as he reviews the page closer.

“Is something wrong?” Harry asks, worried that Niall has found something serious.

“No, nothing wrong. Though it’s a bit more serious than I expected. You see this symbol?” Niall points to a faded red symbol drawn very small next to the pond. It is in the shape of a circle with crescent moons on either side, pointed in opposing directions. 

“What does that mean?” Louis asks.

“It is marking that pond as a sacred location. It would have been important. They would have used it for some of the most powerful rituals. At least that should narrow down our search a bit.” 

Niall adds another note to his pad. He closes the red book and then grabs another grimoire from the stack. This one is an older, brown volume. The leather is faded and flaking at the spine. It’s the thickest one in the collection. He carefully opens it and flips to a page bookmarked with a small strip of fabric. 

“I had gone through a bunch of these and marked all the possible spells. I don’t suppose either of you can read Latin?” 

“Nope.” Louis says.

“No, sorry.” Harry responds.

“Useless.” Niall jokes, shaking his head lightly. “I’ll just flip through these quick and see if anything matches that pond and the glowing water.”

He begins to page through the old book carefully stopping at each section marked with a strip of fabric. He removes the fabric after skimming through each section. After the fifth section, Niall looks up and asks, “Did you happen to ingest any roses before you went swimming?”

Louis and Harry stare at him blankly, and he adds, “Like rosewater, rose petals, rose oil…”

“No, we didn’t.” Louis confirms. Niall nods and turns the page. He continues through two more sections before reaching the end of the book. 

“That one didn’t have anything.” He exchanges it for another old, brown book and repeats the process. The search continues through another hour and two more books. Occasionally, Niall inquires about specific details of their situation. Was there a black cat present? Did they drink any of the pond water? Were there any moon flowers in bloom? Did they light any candles? With each question, Niall rules out another possibility. 

Niall closes the third grimoire and reaches for another off the pile. It’s likely the oldest of the collection. It is not as large as some of the others and is covered in worn, black leather. When he opens it, the binding in the spine cracks audibly in protest.   
Niall flips through three sections, quickly eliminating each one. He turns to the next section. After skimming some lines, he looks up and says, “This one seems promising.” 

Harry and Louis both sit up straighter in their chairs, excited by Niall’s words. They lean in, taking in the two pages spread before them. The left page is titled “Vinculum animarum” and below that, the pages are filled with elaborate fountain pen writing, also in Latin. Disappointed that he can’t read it, Harry slumps back in his chair and waits for Niall to speak.

Louis is not so patient. He leans forward and squints his eyes, as if getting closer to the pages will decode the ancient language. “What’s it say?”

“Hold on, this grimoire is a bit older. It’s harder to translate.” Niall continues to read. His brow furrows over the book as he turns the page. One of the pages has been torn, nearly half the page missing. When he reaches the end of the section, he flips back to the first page and rapidly skims everything again. So His body stiffens in the chair as he continues to review the spell. 

Harry feels a current of unease mix with his curiosity. Louis’ leg is bouncing rapidly under the table, occasionally bumping against his knee. Harry plays with his ring, twisting it around and switching fingers. The tension drapes around them in layers as they wait for Niall to finish his translation. 

Finally, Niall looks up from the grimoire, and rubs at his brow. “You said you went to the pond on this Friday night?”

“Yeah.” Harry confirms. 

“Huh.” Niall hums and pages through his notes. He starts muttering to himself. “That’s impossible… But everything fits… It’s got to be… Holy fuck!” 

“What?” Louis and Harry both ask in unison.

“You guys completed a soul bonding ritual.” Niall looks up from the pages, his mouth slack and his eyes shifting from Harry to Louis.

“What?” Louis utters, cocking his head to the side.

“Like soulmates? Those are real?” Harry asks. The unease bursts, releasing thousands of fluttery butterflies in his stomach. He covers his mouth in shock.

“Obviously.” Niall rolls his eyes. Harry is a bit offended, caught off guard by the rudeness. But it is not his place to call out the one person that is able to help them. 

“Hey, if they do exist, it’s not common knowledge.” Louis retorts, crossing his arms over his body.

“Hah! That’s rich coming from you two.” Niall chortles.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Louis hisses, hackles raised in defense. 

“Your tattoos.” Niall says. Harry folds his less inked arm in front of his more heavily tatted arm, instinctively covering the designs. “I noticed them as soon as you walked into the barn. They alone are enough to give it away. Didn’t you two realize they all matched?” 

“Well, yeah. But nautical tattoos are common.” Harry says. He subconsciously begins to trace the petals of the rose inked on his arm as he considers Niall’s observation. 

“That many?” Niall raises his eyebrow. 

“It’s not like we planned them. We didn’t even know each other a month ago.” Louis explains.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Niall balks, shaking his head. “The Fates knew what they were doing, making you two oblivious idiots soul mates. Make sure you send me an invite to your wedding.” He laughs giddily.

Harry is stunned by Niall’s blatant comment. Before he can think of a witty comeback, Louis ignores the comment and impatiently diverts the subject back to the grimoire. He leans forward with a serious countenance. “So, say that all of this soulmate stuff is true. And that the soul bond ritual is the right one, what does it do?” 

Harry feels a current of unease mix with his curiosity as Niall begins to translate the pages of the grimoire. “It’s called “Vinculum animarum” or The Bond of Souls.” Niall shakes his head in disbelief. 

“That is some old, powerful magic. It ties two souls in a permanent bond.” Niall whistles through his teeth in awe.

“How did we do that?”

Niall skims through the page line by line, translating each bit before summarizing. “At the rise of the full moon, the caster enters the pond with an artifact belonging to the desired lover.”

“It was a full moon.” Harry’s jaw drops in shock. 

“But weren’t you skinny dipping?” Louis questions. Niall barks out a laugh. 

“Yeah, I was. I don’t know what artifact it would be. Maybe it isn’t dependent on objects.” Harry shrugs.

“We can come back to that later, if you think of something.” Niall goes on to translate the next section. “If the souls are compatible, a new bond forms. This bond will create a bridge between the souls. New bonds may include increased lust and trouble focusing for the individual with the spell cast upon them. Some stronger bonds, like those between true soulmates, may create a physical link to the caster.”

“Fuck, that does sound like a match.” Louis mutters. Louis foot starts tapping against the floor. 

Harry rubs at his eyes. “So how do we get rid of it?” Harry asks. He cards his fingers through his hair, pulling a section out of his face.

“Well, it says without further action the spell wears off in one full cycle of the moon.” Niall flips the page.

“That’s not so bad. When’s the next full moon?” Harry asks. He folds his hands on top of the table.

“That doesn’t matter. You can’t reverse what’s been done.” Niall says ominously.

“What? But, the connection already went away?” Louis voice raises in pitch at the confusion.

“The physical link, or bridge as they called it, went away because you must have completed the second half of the ritual.”

“There’s another part?” Louis groans. He is getting frustrated at the lack of understanding of the situation. Harry places a hand on his back and rubs soothing circles.

Niall nods and continues to translate, “The caster and the lover enter the pond and make contact during the new moon following the full moon ritual. The bond is most powerful if they remain in contact during the rising of the new moon.” Niall looks up from the book, a huge grin spread across his face. “Congrats, you two are officially soul bonded.”

Harry pulls his hand from Louis’ back. He asks, “What does that even mean?” 

“Sorry, most of that page is gone. It’s torn here and it looks like something spilled there.” Niall leans in closer, tracing his finger along a few lines, then slowly shakes his head. “I can only make out a few words.” He points to each one and translates. “This one says permanent. This one says desire. And this one says emotional tie. Sorry that’s not much help.” 

Frustration rises in Harry’s chest, heating his face and turning his thoughts sour. “So, what? We’re just _soul bonded_ forever now? All because I went for a late night swim?” 

“Yeah, seems like it.” Niall laughs. 

“What happens now?” Louis asks hesitantly. He’s twirling his thumbs in his lap. They turn to Niall for answers.

“You’ll figure out how to live with it.” Niall states nonchalantly. 

They spend the next half hour pouring over the details of the ritual, and trying to decipher what they can read of the final page. Niall explains how rare the completion of the ritual must have been, as there were only two couples recorded that had tried it. What are the odds, then, that Harry and Louis would unknowingly complete all of the steps in the correct order and at the right time in the lunar cycle without knowing of any of the consequences? When Harry asks this of Niall, he just says “The Fates know what they are doing.”

Eventually, Niall turns to check the time on the wall clock. The hands read quarter to six. “Oh, it’s getting late.” He stands from the table and stretches his arms over his head. “I’ve got to get back to my goats. Hope you don’t mind me kicking you both out after such a big discovery, but the ladies get impatient if I don’t feed them on time.”

He leads Harry and Louis back to their car. Before they leave, Niall adds his phone number into Louis’ phone and urges them to call if they ever need anything else. He shouts one final reminder to invite him to their wedding as they close their car doors. Harry balks at how sure Niall is that they will be getting married. They haven’t even gone on a date yet. 

The ride is even quieter on the way back, as if they are both holding their breath, afraid to rupture the fragile tension in the car. Harry is unsure of where to even begin the conversation, so he doesn’t try to start one at all. Instead, Harry spends the entire ride thinking about what they had just learned. 

It’s such a bizarre concept. Harry has watched rom coms, read books, knows the stories, but he never thought that it was actually a real thing. That there was a soulmate out there for him or that the Fates would draw them together as they did. 

And there is the fact that they are going to be separated in just a few short days. The prospect of leaving the cabin, leaving Louis and returning home is enough to send Harry into a panic. He cannot fathom the hundreds of notifications waiting for him on his phone, or the dozens of interviews and events that are likely scheduled for him once he returns to LA. He isn’t ready for their month long retreat to end or to go back to his lonely life without Louis’ constant presence.

Talking is easier once they are out of the enclosed car. There is more air for their new problems to breathe without either of them acknowledging their existence. It seems there is an unspoken agreement to avoid the one topic they don’t know how to handle. They make an easy dinner together and eat it out on the back porch, enjoying the cool fall night. The sky turns golden and then stains dark blue as they sit together on the porch, talking about everything except for the soul bonding. 

When Louis starts shivering from the chill in the air, Harry pulls him off the porch and they head inside to bed. Louis crawls in behind Harry, surrounding him in his arms and tucking his cold feet between Harry’s legs for warmth. He pulls the layers of blankets over them, tucking them in a tight cocoon of warmth.

Harry waits for sleep to come. But Louis is more still than usual. After nights of sharing a bed, Harry has become accustomed to the way Louis shifts unconsciously when asleep. He debates asking Louis what is keeping him awake. 

A wave of want forces all the blood south, and Harry suppresses a moan at the unexpected sensation. But the desire is quickly smothered by a sudden sense of dread. The rapid change in emotion is unsettling. He shifts back into Louis’ arms. Louis’ hard length nestles against his crack. Harry’s eyes fly open and he stills. Could it be that Louis is turned on and Harry is feeling it? The possibility that those changing emotions aren’t his crashes into him. 

Harry catalogues these emotions. The heavy weight of dread is nearly paralyzing, yet there is no logical cause for him to feel it. Underneath the dread, an electric current of desire thrums through his veins. Calling attention to this emotion makes Harry’s heart race. 

These two emotions are not enough to prove his theory to be true. He’s not certain of anything, but he is turned on. He wants everything that Louis is willing to give. But, it seems Louis is reluctant to give Harry anything. 

So Harry will just have to work for it. He tries to tease Louis into giving him what he wants. Harry starts tracing lightly up and down his arms, goosebumps rising in his wake. Harry feels Louis holding back, keeping tension in all his unmoving limbs. When Louis subtly rocks his hips forward once, Harry knows his teasing is effective. He turns his head and he pecks the corner of Louis’ lips. Then he traces the crease with his tongue. Louis parts his lips and takes him in, a searing kiss igniting the embers between them. Louis grasps for control and the tension melts from his body. He grabs a handful of Harry’s hair and pulls him down into another bruising kiss. 

Suddenly the world flips, as Louis rolls Harry onto his back and switches their position. He makes quick work of prepping Harry and then he’s pressing in, filling Harry. Louis fucks into him with purpose. It’s not fast, but not soft either. Their voices combine in a loud chorus as they try to hold back their orgasms. Burning desire inflates Harry’s chest. Their emotions are so strong between them. Harry can’t separate what’s his and what’s Louis’ but it all feels good. Harry scratches across Louis’ back as he comes. Louis continues to thrust until reaches his own climax, stilling deep inside him. Louis collapses onto his chest and Harry’s eyes drift shut as he comes down from his high. Sleep takes him before he even notices.

\- - -

Monday starts off languid. Harry wakes slowly, fighting to hold on to the last tangents of sleep. Louis is still asleep, softly breathing into Harry neck. The warmth of his limbs surrounds Harry. Harry doesn’t want to break the spell just yet. Tomorrow will be the last time they wake up in the cabin, wake up in each others arms. And then it’s back to LA. Back to the hustle of a tight filming schedule with long hours and demanding acting performances.

Harry cracks his eyes open. He notices how nicely their arm tattoos line up as they lay. Harry’s soft rose on his forearm lies just beneath Louis’ dagger drawn sharply on his arm. Further down, Louis’ rope is nearly connected to Harry’s anchor. And there are other too, like Harry’s ship and Louis’ compass. There are so many of his seemingly personal tattoos that perfectly match to one of Louis’. Niall was right about that. 

Thoughts of Niall bring him back to the discovery he’d made last night. The discovery that he may be able to feel Louis’ emotions. Moments of the night before drift through his mind. The intensity of the sex, the shared connectedness, the rush of emotion from Louis. He needs to tell Louis, needs to ask if he’s experiencing the same thing. 

But talking about the soul bond will also bring up talk about their relationship, or lack of one. Harry is afraid to have that discussion. He doesn’t know if Louis is willing to continue their relationship, especially since Harry is still locked in a closet by contracts and NDAs. He hopes that Louis would be able to look past the closeting and the hidden nature of whatever relationship they could form, but he is worried that it will be too hard. Louis doesn’t seem like one to hide anything, and asking him to do so would be cruel. 

The best case scenario is that Louis wants to date him and that they can make time for secret dates during his limited free time during filming. But the more likely scenario is that Louis goes his separate way, and Harry will have to figure out how to move on. Harry frets over the two options, knowing neither is an ideal scenario for a new relationship. 

Harry sighs, then turns in Louis’ arms and snuggles into his warmth. Louis is on the edge of sleep. His eyes remain closed as his arm tightens around him. Harry places soft closed mouth kisses along the length of Louis neck. Louis’ chest rises, taking a deep breath as he wakes to the soft kisses. Louis’ hand moves down toward Harry’s hip and rests on the top of the curve. Harry sucks a mark on the side of Louis’ neck coaxing him awake with little nips of his teeth. 

Louis finally opens his eyes. 

“Good morning.” Louis whispers. He rubs the sleep from his eyes.

“G'morning.” Harry returns the greeting with another gentle peck of his lips. 

In the softness of the morning, Harry broaches the topic they’d both been avoiding with careful words. Despite his fears, he is too anxious to keep his discovery a secret from Louis.

“Hey, Lou, what are you feeling right now?”

“Sleepy.” Louis’ eyes drift shut, still not fully awake.

Harry thinks for a bit rubbing at his temple. “Do you think we can feel each other’s emotions?”

“What do you mean?” Louis shifts back to look at Harry.

“I think I can feel some of your emotions. Like last night. Or when we were driving to Niall’s.”

That gets Louis’ attention, he pushes himself onto his elbow. “What was I feeling then?”

“Last night I felt like you were dreading something? It was weird and I don’t know how, but I could tell it was you.”

Louis hums in thought, but doesn’t comment.

“And in the car, I felt this really weird nervousness and my palms were sweaty. But I’m not usually nervous to meet new people. But I think that might have been you, not me.”

“That’s weird.” Louis says. He closes his eyes for a moment. “I guess I haven’t been paying attention. All my emotions have been weird lately, so it’s hard to say.”

“It’s really subtle most of the time. I wasn’t sure about it, still not really. But maybe it’s like the pain thing, where it gets stronger over time.” 

“Well, Niall did mention something about emotional ties, that could mean something.”

“Yeah, that’s what I’d been thinking.” Harry agrees. 

“What are we going to do if it’s true? If we can sense each other’s emotions?” Louis asks, brushing a strand of hair from Harry’s face. 

“I guess it’s like Niall said, we’ll figure out how to live with it.” 

Harry lowers his head, his forehead pressing up against Louis’, staring into his blue eyes. Sweet kisses and soft touches follow. They stay in bed all morning, only deciding to face the day when Harry’s stomach growls loudly. 

They’re more active after lunch. The afternoon is spent cleaning up the cabin and packing their bags. 

“Unfortunately, this isn’t a hotel. We’re our own maid service today.” Louis says, thrusting Harry a mop into Harry’s hand. They blast an oldies playlist while they scrub the kitchen and clean the two bathrooms. It’s great teamwork. When they get to the living room, Harry picks up a feather duster, and Louis follows along behind with the vacuum. They’re halfway done with the small living room when Queen’s “I Want to Break Free” begins to play. Harry bursts into laughter at the irony of listening to this song while cleaning, as they could easily reenact the iconic music video. Louis must catch on because he struts around, thrusting his hips and pushing the vacuum in time to the beat, channeling his inner Mercury. Harry raises the feather duster up like a mic, singing along. When the chorus comes, Louis and Harry are shouting out the lyrics loud and obnoxious. 

They fall into a heap on the freshly vacuumed carpet as the song fades out. Giggles erupt from Harry first, which set Louis off in uncontrollable laughter. They clutch at their stomachs and Harry can hardly breathe as they bask in the ridiculousness of their impromptu karaoke session.

The humor fades out quickly as they move to the bedrooms to start packing their bags. Their clothes have merged over the past few days, spread out around the two bedrooms. Harry doesn’t know when it started happening, but they’d started to share clothes. He would pull on a pair of Louis’ shorts while getting out of bed in the morning. Louis would reach for one of Harry’s hoodies when he got cold. At night, the clothes would come off as they tumbled into bed. Now they are left to sort through the items, doling them out as if splitting property after a break up. It’s one more reminder that they will be going back to their separate lives come tomorrow morning. 

A deep longing fills Harry’s chest. He glances over to Louis and catches him running finger along the frayed edge of one of Harry’s hoodies. Louis folds it up and stuffs it into the bottom of his own bag. While Harry knows most people would be upset by someone stealing clothing, Harry isn’t bothered. In fact, it gives Harry hope that maybe Louis wants him as much as Harry does. If Louis isn’t able to part with a sentimental fraying hoodie, they might be able to make a relationship work after all.


	12. Chapter 12

Louis locks up the cabin as they prepare to leave. The dew is still damp on the grass and the sun is still breaking over the horizon. They’ve already loaded up the car with their luggage. He gives one last look around at everything and then hops into the passenger seat. Harry drives them to the little municipal airport at the far edge of town they had arrived at so long ago. The private jet is already waiting with one attendant ready to greet them. They unload their luggage at the plane and hand off the keys to the rental car. Liam was great at having this whole situation arranged to make this travel easy. Louis will be sure to thank him for everything he’s done during the past month. 

Louis feels a bit of apprehension as he steps onto the plane. He doesn’t know what life in LA will look like now. He’s still unsure about the whole soul bond thing, and hasn’t felt any of the same shared emotions that Harry had mentioned. Soulmates or not, though, Louis would still like to be with Harry. The only issue is that they haven’t defined their relationship, and at this point, Louis is afraid to ask. 

Louis doesn’t want to impose his desires onto Harry and make him feel obligated to stay in a relationship just because some crackpot goat farmer told them the moon phases and old magic said they were soulmates. Harry had been so ecstatic when the physical connection to Louis had broken and while at Niall’s he had been determined to find a way to reverse the soul bond. It seems as if he isn’t interested in a relationship with Louis.

And that makes sense. Louis won’t have the same claim on him back in LA as he does when they are the only two people at a remote cabin. Harry is a famous actor under immense pressure to remain in the closet. It would be foolish to assume that Harry would want to add any stress to that situation by beginning a secret relationship. So Louis is preparing to go back to life as it was a month ago. He has a few jobs lined up after filming _Redemption in Rome_ that will keep him busy and he should be able to move on.

They sit next to each other on the plane. Louis sleeps through the whole flight, his head lolled against Harry’s firm shoulder. He wakes to Harry gently smoothing a hand down his arm and whispering, “Lou, wake up.”

They disembark and get their suitcases from the security personnel that is waiting for them in the VIP section of the airport. The man ushers them to a waiting car that will drive them to their homes. Louis lives closer to LAX so he is dropped off first. 

He steels himself for the goodbye. His palms are sweaty and he subtly wipes them on his pants. He tries to slow his heartbeat, pounding unsteadily in his chest as they enter his neighborhood. When the car pulls up in front of his apartment complex, he is not ready to leave. But he has to let Harry go. He pulls him into a solid hug, pressing a thumb firmly into his back. He breathes in the familiar scent of Harry’s shampoo and choked back the lump. He pulls away, even though it doesn’t feel like enough time. 

“I’ll see you at filming, Harry.” Louis says, offering a little smile before he jumps out of the car. 

“See you.” Harry looks a bit startled by the abrupt exit. His hand reaches out to follow Louis, but he doesn’t stop him. He doesn’t hold him back and tell him to stay. His hand drops onto the leather seat where Louis had been sitting. The door slams shut and Louis doesn’t look back. If he did, he wouldn’t be able to let the car drive away. 

His two suitcases and gym bag are stacked on the curb, so he hauls them up the path to the door. He gets into an elevator and pushes the button for his floor. As the elevator doors slide shut, his somber face stares back in the polished door. A single tear rolls down his cheek and he doesn’t bother to wipe it away.

\- - -

Louis’ biggest regret is that he didn’t kiss Harry before he left the car. He could have had one last kiss to remember before he let Harry go. Instead, he settled for a hug that would never be enough.

It has been two days since returning to his apartment and Louis is miserable. He struggles every hour, every minute, to not burst into tears or throw a vase at the wall. But he doesn’t even have a vase to throw. That seems like something Harry would have in his home, lots of cute vases available to shatter during a breakdown. Louis’ apartment in contrast is too empty and bland. 

The longer he is away from Harry, the harder it gets. There is a huge weight sitting in his chest and he is suffocating in a fog of misery. He’s starting to believe that Harry was right about sensing the other’s emotions. He’d started feeling the unique surges of emotions Tuesday night. The blasts of intense emotion never quite match up with the other feelings simmering in his mind. He’ll be choking back a sob that threatens to escape when he remembers a joke Harry told, but a raging mass of anger will bowl him over like a bull set to destroy a china shop. Or he will be feeling remorseful, phone in hand and ready to call up Harry to apologize for leaving when suddenly a storm of confusion drowns out his thoughts until he can’t even remember what there was to apologize for. It seems impossible that all of this hurt can come from just him alone.

His emotions start overlapping with Harry’s and he cannot tell where his start and Harry’s end. All the emotional turmoil is making it hard to function. He goes to bed but can’t shut off his thoughts. He cooks a meal but has no appetite. He makes a cup of tea but it goes cold before he remembers to drink it. He tries to read a book, but can’t focus on the characters. He tries to watch Netflix but can’t settle on any of the thousands of options. Everything is overwhelming but not enough at the same time. He coasts through life for days like this and plans to continue to do so until he is scheduled to show up on set for filming next week. 

His phone has gone off a few times. Each notification from someone that isn’t Harry adds to the sting of sadness. He doesn’t bother to return the texts from his friends, doesn’t take up their offers of nights out, and ignores calls from his siblings. He can’t bring himself to interact with other people in the state he is in.

On Friday afternoon, Louis is curled up on the couch, as he has been every day since Tuesday. His bare feet are too cold, but he is too tired to get a blanket from across the room. The telly is off because he can’t even be bothered to reach for the remote. It’s exhausting to feel the emotions of two people, too many to be contained in one head.

He holds his phone up and opens the Twitter app, just for something to pass the time. But even the brief posts and snappy videos aren’t enough to hold his attention. His thumb drags up the screen, scrolling past unread tweets and memes he doesn’t bother to understand. But one post in particular catches his eye as zips up the screen. It’s unmistakably a photo of Harry. He swipes the photo back onto his screen and looks closer. It’s a pap photo of him and the actress. It is dated yesterday. Harry’s life obviously hasn’t changed. 

He warily clicks through to the article and sees Harry laughing at whatever the girl is saying. They’re sitting across from each other at a nice cafe. And there are more photos of them walking through a park. The article is nearly a play-by-play of their date. 

Each picture is worth a thousand words, but Louis can see between the lines. He can see the way Harry’s laughter doesn’t reach his eyes, the stiff way he sits in the chair, and the unnatural way he holds her hand. These photos may explain the disdain and intense disinterest that had filled his head yesterday afternoon. 

Louis questions everything he has been feeling. Is Harry’s unhappiness due to the draining requirements of his career? Or is the unhappiness a result of missing Louis? Either way it doesn’t feel like it’s Louis place to interfere. Louis can’t hold him back from the career his loves. If they try for a relationship, it would have to be at Harry’s discretion. 

He tosses the phone to the side and sighs. 

Without his phone to fill the time, Louis does the only thing he can bring himself to do. He rolls himself a joint and tunes everything out. The fog in his mind obscures the emotions, even those from Harry. The quiet is welcome after the barrage he’d been experiencing the past three days. He spreads out in bed and stares blankly at the patterns swirled in the plaster of his ceiling. 

In a moment of lowered inhibition and lack of proper decision making, Louis picks up his phone and follows all of Harry’s social media accounts. He puts them all on notifs for good measure. If he can’t have all of Harry, at least he can get the bits of himself that he shares with the world. He’s very thorough, following Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Linkedin, and even one unused Soundcloud account that he’d found linked in the depths of Tumblr. 

Satisfied that he has followed all the accounts, he plugs his phone into the cord and sets it on the nightstand. He flops over onto his stomach, inviting sleep to numb out the rest of his consciousness. Louis wallows in his own induced misery until he falls asleep. 

\----

Louis startles awake too early on Saturday morning by the buzzing of his phone. He struggles to fully wake up after his first deep sleep in four days. He coughs a bit, clearing the scratchiness from his throat. When he remembers that it was his phone that woke him, he reaches for it, unplugging it from the charger. He squints at the too-bright screen. It’s a twitter notification from Harry. 

Louis groans. He is upset with himself for stooping so low as to put Harry on notifs. He decides to right his wrongs from the previous night, determined to unfollow the accounts before he gets in too deep. He clicks the notification to open the Twitter app. A huge rush of longing comes from Harry, nearly buckling Louis over. His chest bursts with the flaming pain as the Twitter app finally loads.

  
  


“You're all the things I've got to remember.” He is unable to place the words for a moment, though the familiarity itches at the front of his mind. He struggles to identify the source, rolling the phrase over and over. The intense longing emotion slowly burns out, replaced by a lower frequency sadness that seems to follow him nearly every day since getting back. As it recedes, his mind clears enough and recognition dawns on him. The tweet is a lyric from “Take on Me”. The song Harry had sung in the woods. Bittersweet nostalgia spreads through him as he recalls the day in the woods. Every detail within the memory of that afternoon is precious: the warm sunlight, Harry’s velvety voice, and their earnest conversation. 

Louis clicks out of the most recent tweet to browse the rest of Harry’s feed. He scrolls past the few promo tweets that were sent in the past month. The first personal tweet he comes across is one he recognizes instantly. It’s the quoted caption and link to the Instagram photo he’d sent at the beginning of the month. The black and white socks and the lyric posted just hours after Louis had advised him that his fame wouldn’t always be black or white as he was struggling with the harsher realities of his career.

And the “Black or White” post isn’t the only tweet that means more than the characters. He finds dozens of lyrics tweeted over the last five years. Each cryptic tweet Louis reads is further evidence of Harry’s proclivity for posting messages through song lyrics. It’s likely that his most recent tweet is a message. Hope blooms in his chest that it might be a message meant for Louis.

Louis stops scrolling and he decides to go for it. Louis bolts out of bed and pulls on the first clean clothes he can find. There is the possibility that he has read too much into the message, or misunderstood the post completely If that’s the case, he’ll leave with his tail between his legs. He won’t know unless he tries. After all, it’s no better to be safe than sorry. 

The drive over to Harry’s takes too long. He’s jittery and nauseous with anxiety. Louis nearly turns the car around three times. But a note of cautious anticipation edges in from Harry’s mind, and he stays on course. He hopes Harry can feel the determination and nerves pulling Louis toward him. Just under an hour after he’d left his apartment, he pulls into into Harry’s drive.

Louis can’t get out of his car fast enough and then he sprints up to the front steps. The door swings open and Harry steps onto the porch. This version of Harry is different from the Harry he’d left on Tuesday. Even from a distance, the dark circles under his eyes, wrinkled clothing, and untamed hair stand out. Louis does not take time to catalogue the changes or contemplate the causes. He barrels into Harry’s arms and nearly knocks them over. 

Louis wraps himself tightly around Harry, folding his arms around his solid shoulders. He bursts into tears, a release of all the sadness and longing that he’d bottled up over the past week. He starts sobbing out apologies and excuses into Harry’s neck. “I’m sorry. So, sorry. I should have called.”

“I know.” Harry chokes back tears as he rocks them side to side in the tight embrace. Louis is unable to control his own tears, and they continue to flow. He has no idea how long he cries. The whole while Harry holds him, rubbing his back and swaying them gently. It feels so right to be in Harry’s arms and he never wants to leave. That thought grounds Louis, and he’s able to pull himself together. It takes minutes and some focused breathing for Louis to compose himself and finally stave off the sobs.

Louis lifts his head from the crook of Harry’s neck, cringing at the dampness left on his skin. Harry places a chaste kiss on Louis’ lips and wipes at the tear streaks on his cheeks. Then he takes a step back and grabs Louis’ hands, holding them between their bodies and says, “We need to talk.” 

Louis nods. Harry pulls him into the house and they settle onto the couch, not an inch of space between where they’re curled into each other. One of Louis’ hands is still wrapped in Harry’s. He wishes he could stay here, with Harry holding his hand, and not have to talk about all the complicated feelings and problems that have developed in the last week. There is a tension filling up what little space there is between them, but it is not the fun kind. 

Louis uses honesty to slice through the clotted tension. “I missed you,” he whispers. He squeezes Harry’s hand. 

“I missed you, too.” He whispers back. A hurt look crosses his face. Harry’s confusion tangles around Louis’ mind. “But, I don’t know why you left in the first place?” His voice raises at the end, an opening for Louis to explain.

“I don’t want to hold you back.” Louis looks at their entwined hands, not able to meet Harry’s eyes. “You’re everything to me, but what if I’m not enough for you. You could have anyone.”

“I don’t want anyone. I want you.” Harry places a palm on Louis’ cheek, coaxing him to lift his face, to meet Harry’s eyes. “Always you.”

Louis wants to believe the warmth in his eyes, the gentleness of his touch, the sincerity of his words. But he can’t dismiss Harry’s determination to get rid of the spell and all the failed attempts to break the curse. Louis swallows around the lump in his throat. He’s already cried so much, he doesn’t want to start again. “But, you were so determined to reverse the ritual? I didn’t want you to be stuck with me just because a goat farmer said I’m your soulmate.” 

“I didn’t plan on meeting my soulmate. Hell, I didn’t even know soulmates were actually real before I met you. But this feels right.” Harry squeezes Louis’ hand back and smiles timidly. “I think the Fates knew exactly what they were doing, so who are we to fight them.”

“But, how do you know that it wasn’t just the soul bond?” Louis frowns. He’s still not convinced that Harry wasn’t magically coerced into feeling attracted to Louis. He needs to be sure that Harry chooses Louis for himself, not for the magic.

“No, it started even before all that. I’ve had the biggest crush on you since that day in Liam’s office. I’ve fallen in love with you, Lou. And I wouldn’t want it any other way.” Harry ducks his head, a blush coloring his cheeks at the candid admission. 

“Oh.” Louis is speechless as he processes that. Tears well in his eyes, but this time they are happy tears. Louis glances down at their hands and sees their rope and anchor tattoos lined up. “Do you think we fell in love so fast because of the soulmate thing?”

The “we” unintentionally slips out, but Louis doesn’t need to take it back. It wasn’t a straightforward admission like Harry’s, but it has a similar effect. A current of affection and love flow freely between their minds. 

“Especially, because we’re soulmates. Even the moon knows we belong together.” Harry says with conviction. Louis wants to bask in the brilliant glow of elation emanating from Harry. Louis hopes Harry is feeling his own bright happiness bursting in his chest. 

“She does, doesn’t she?” Louis says wistfully, sending a prayer to the moon, the Fates, or whatever celestial force brought Harry into his life. He reaches for Harry, wrapping his free hand around the back of Harry’s head and pulling him into a searing kiss. 

Louis pulls back, breathless from their kiss. He stares into Harry’s bright eyes. “In case it wasn’t obvious, I love you, too, Harry.”

Harry giggles and wraps his arms tightly around Louis. “Well, that’s good. ‘Cause our souls are kind of permanently bonded.”

“They really are, huh.” Louis rests his head on Harry’s shoulder, breathing in his familiar scent. They fall into a comfortable silence, basking in the intense love spreading around them.

The permanence of the soul bond no longer induces anxiety in Louis. There’s a comfort in knowing that Harry and he belong together. He considers how far they’ve come in just a few short hours. He’s gone from being miserable and alone to contently wrapped in the arms of his soulmate. As Louis thinks about what the future with his soulmate might hold, he remembers Niall’s firm request for an invitation to their wedding. Louis chuckles to himself. 

“What’s funny?” Harry asks.

“Do you think we should text Niall an update? I bet he will be excited to hear that we are working out this whole soul bond thing.” 

“Eventually.” Harry says, kissing Louis’ temple. “But for tonight, let’s keep this between you, me, and the moon.”


	13. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! This fic has been a blast to write and I couldn't quite let go of the characters yet, so here is an epilogue!

The black Land Rover rounds the last corner and comes to a gradual stop. Every few minutes the car inches forward. Harry leans over and peers out of the tinted window. There are a few cars ahead of them. It won’t be long now before he and Louis will step out onto the red carpet in front of the cameras, the fans, and the world. This will be their first public appearance together since announcing their engagement on Instagram.

Harry twists the newest ring around his ring finger nervously. He is tempted to run his hand through his hair, though he catches himself at the last minute. He would never hear the end of it if he wrecked his hair stylist’s work before he’d even gotten out of the car. 

Louis grabs his hand, his palms equally clammy, and begins rubbing circles on the back of Harry’s hand. A wave of pride and a tint of excitement flood his mind. Louis has been channeling a similar cocktail of his pride and excitement to Harry for the past week as Harry has gotten increasingly antsy while arranging every detail of his very first Oscar night as a nominee for Best Actor. 

Harry is never more thankful for their unique ability to share emotions than he is when he is nervous. Louis is always there to ground him. They never hesitate to send love and support across their soulbond when they can sense the other needs the reminder. It had taken all of their first winter together to learn to control and use the ability. 

There had been a few hiccups at first. Like once when Louis was coaching at a gym and started sobbing uncontrollably from an unexplained sadness. It turned out that Harry had been watching _The Notebook_. Or that time Louis felt frustrated because he’d forgotten to buy milk and Harry rowed with Liam over a minor inconvenience when their separate frustrations had compounded. Occasionally, an intense burst of emotion from one was enough to incapacitate the other for hours, as their minds needed to adjust to the new soul bond. But with a lot of practice and a little help from Niall, Louis and Harry had learned to embrace their soul bond and all the surprises that came with it. 

Harry looks down at the entwined hands, where he knows their tattoos line up beneath the fabrics of their suits. Harry’s eyes trace the bit of rope peeking out from Louis’ sleeve as he focuses on his breathing to calm himself.

The past year and a half since filming of _Redemption in Rome_ have been chaotic and full of changes. 

Harry, with encouragement from Louis, had taken a break from acting. With Liam’s help, he renegotiated his contract and started a new project. He is now working on his first album, writing songs with a well known producer and recording in an actual studio. 

Then, there had been the changes in his personal life too. Louis had moved in nearly immediately after their return to LA. They’d made up an excuse that it was easier to carpool to the studio for filming. But in reality, it didn’t feel right to live nearly an hour apart when they’d rather be together. They dated for eleven months before Louis proposed on the first anniversary of their accidental soul bonding. They are planning to get married on the second anniversary this coming September. Just remembering the proposal and their upcoming official wedding made Harry feel a rush of excitement and he twists the silver band around his finger idly. 

And then there was the biggest change of all. Harry had come out. It would not have felt right to start this next chapter of his career without being able to be truly honest in his songwriting. So he put his foot down and demanded that his management give him that freedom. With Liam’s legal expertise and Louis’ support, Harry was able to make coming out on his own terms a condition of his new contract. 

The week of his coming out, Harry and Louis went back to the secluded, off-the-grid cabin. Liam offered to handle the business side of things and sent them on their way. It was nice to let the drama unfold without them present, and they were both thankful for the time alone. A week later, Harry and Louis returned from the cabin ready to make their first public appearance. They walked the red carpet for the premiere of _Redemption in Rome_ arm in arm and responded to some interview questions to confirm their relationship status. The much smaller event still made all the tabloid headlines and trended on twitter for over twenty four hours. 

And now they were about to walk another red carpet, this time at the Oscars.

Their car rolls forward once again. This time when they come to a stop, the passenger door next to Louis is opened from the outside. Louis gets out first and then he holds out his hand to help Harry down from the SUV. They turn, facing a barrage of flashing cameras and screaming fans together. Louis’ hand finds its way to the small of Harry’s back as they walk the first few feet of the red carpet. With all of the public appearances and different business events they’ve attended since coming out, Louis has taken to grounding Harry with his presence. He must be able to feel the way it instantly slows Harry’s heartbeat and calms his thoughts. 

It’s a never-ending stream of rushed interviews and signed autographs until they reach the end of the red carpet. Louis’ hand doesn’t leave his back.

They finally entire the quieter hall of the theater, where an usher in an all black suit leads Harry and Louis down the aisle to two seats reserved with their names. Harry takes a moment to take it all in.

Who’d ever done the assigned seating placed them only two rows back from the stage. Of course they’d keep all of Hollywood’s most recognizable actors front and center. It still comes as a shock to him that he is one of those actors. He reads off the name cards of the seats yet to be filled. Rachel McAdams will be seated next to Louis and Matt Damon will be seated further down their row. In the row behind him are Viola Davis, Jessica Chastain, Idris Elba, and Zayn Malik. 

Harry had met Zayn when they’d both had small parts in a movie a few years ago. It is not surprising that they would seat Zayn directly behind Harry. They are two of the five nominees for Best Actor this year and the film critics couldn’t come to a consensus of who would win. While Harry’s performance as Antonius was hailed as captivating and intense, Malik had presented a heart-wrenching performance in _Icarus Falls_. All of the entertainment news sources were saying that Harry’s odds were tied with Malik’s. It was anyone’s guess which actor would take home the Oscar.

Harry can feel excitement bubbling in his chest and looks around. The theater is starting to fill up with other actors that he recognizes but has never met. Anne Hathaway is walking down the aisle to his left. Meryl Streep and Matthew McConaughey are talking on the other side of the theater. Eddie Redmayne is taking a selfie with Rami Malek to his right. Harry tries not to be too star-struck. But it’s so hard to reign in all the excitement and awe when Louis’ emotions are overlapping with his own. He forgets that while Louis has been in the film industry for years, he hasn’t been on Harry’s side of the camera before. Louis is still new to all of the biggest Hollywood events. 

As the theater begins to fill up, Harry goes into his showbiz mode. Harry attempts to shake off Louis’ starstruck wonder as he pulls them into a conversation with some producers and directors that he has worked with in the past. He introduces them to Louis and joins in their polite small talk. Before he knows it, the house lights drop and the music swells around them. The whole theater collectively takes their seats. The curtain rises to a hilarious musical number as the introduction of the 92nd Academy Awards.

The night passes quickly, with the presenters calling off nominations and opening envelopes. It is all a blur to Harry. His nerves ramp up as they get closer to the end of the night. _Redemption in Rome_ had five nominations coming into the night. So far, the Best Supporting Actress category went to another movie, but they’d snagged the Best Cinematography and Best Costume Design. Those two wins offered a brief reprieve from his nerves, as the elation momentarily blots out all the butterflies in his stomach. 

It’s coming down to the last few categories of the night. He doesn’t focus at all on the Best Actress announcement. His costar was unfortunately not nominated, despite her stellar performance as Carinia. 

The Best Actor category is next. He is sure his heart rate is off the charts and Louis must be miserable feeling all of Harry’s anxiety. He looks toward Louis, who offers a small reassuring smile. When the winning actress leaves the stage and the cheering dies down, his nerves turn all the way up. Nausea swells in Harry’s stomach.

The emcee announces Leslie Jones and Ryan Reynolds as the next presenters. They walk across the stage and begin their intro. Louis reaches out, grasping Harry’s hand and sending feelings of assurance and adoration through their bond. It instantly calms him, reminding him that award or not, he will be going home with the love of his life, his soulmate.

But it would still be nice to win. 

Leslie announces each of the nominees before a brief clip of their character is played on the large screen. They announce Harry first and play a brief clip from the scene where Magnus attacks Antonius in his home. Antonius escapes from under Magnus and grabs his dagger from his bedside in one swift move. Antonius holds the dagger against Magnus’s throat and Antonius threatens to end Magnus’s life, but offers mercy in exchange for the life of Carinia, Antonius’s love. The tension of the scene is clearly palpable despite the brevity of the clip. 

Seeing the dramatic scene once again brings Harry back to his training at the cabin when Louis was coaching him on the self-defense techniques that he used to break out of Magnus’s hold. It makes Harry consider just how far they’ve come, from the most awkward training session to sitting next to Louis at the Oscars. The events of the past year are nothing Harry could have predicted, but he wouldn’t have it any other way. 

As the presenters introduce the fifth nominee, a cameraman appears and settles in the aisle, focused on Harry or Zayn behind him. It’s hard to tell, which is probably why they’d seated them as they had. Clearly one of their names is in that envelope.

His vision narrows on the envelope in Ryan Reynolds’ hand. It feels like forever before he break the seal on the envelope and Harry watches him unfold the paper in slow motion. Harry holds his breath. He doesn’t realize he’s missed the announcement until Louis is shouting his name. 

“Harry!” Louis pulls him off the chair and into a hug. “Congrats, babe!” 

“I won?” Harry pulls back, his face scrunched in disbelief.

Louis bursts into laughter. “Yeah, you did! Now go up there and accept it before they change their minds.” Louis’ hand squeezes his bicep before gently pushing Harry, guiding him to head toward the stage.

Harry can’t believe that he had gotten so anxious that he’d tuned out the presenters. At least he had Louis to catch him, otherwise that could have ended in an embarrassing tabloid-worthy moment. He directs a ripple of gratefulness to Louis as he makes his way up the stairs.

Harry walks the short distance across the stage and takes the Oscar and the hug offered by Leslie Jones. Ryan Reynolds hands him the envelope and offers a congratulatory hug as well. Before he steps out of their quick embrace, Harry feels a sharp sting of jealousy at the front of his mind. It’s quickly stamped out, a sure sign that Louis hadn’t intended to share that particular emotion with Harry. 

Harry smirks to himself. He might be able to use that knowledge later, when he can tease Louis. His jealousy has a habit of making an appearance when it’s least expected, and usually leads to memorable nights. But for now, he has a speech to make. 

He approaches the microphone and glances out across the audience. Knowing that he is being broadcast live around the world, he makes an effort not to squint against the bright stage lights. It is apparent that the theater is huge, but with the glare of the lights, he can barely see the first few rows. Luckily, he is able to find Louis next to his empty seat and he is smiling up at Harry. One deep breath to steady his voice and Harry begins his speech.

“Wow,” Harry looks down at the Oscar in his hand for the first time, astonishment flows through him. He has nearly forgotten the speech he planned and struggles to recall what he wants to say. A tide of steady confidence fills him, and he finds Louis in the audience signalling him with a subtle thumbs up.

“I can’t believe this. Congratulations to the other nominees, it was an incredible category this year. Every nominee was at the top of their game and equally deserving. Thank you to The Academy,” Harry lifts up the Oscar, the golden statue gleaming under the lights. “This award means so much more that I can describe. Thank you so much to the cast and crew of _Redemption in Rome_. I wouldn’t be here without each and every one of you. I never imagined when I took this role that it would change my life. Antonius was a strong, courageous gladiator, heralded by his community for fighting for what he believed was right and treating people with kindness. 

“While I worked to bring Antonius to life on screen, the character Antonius taught me that I could bring a bit of his gladiator spirit into my own life. I made an active choice to send kindness toward strangers, toward my friends, and toward myself. I learned that it sometimes requires an extraordinary amount of bravery to be kind where it is most needed in this world. It is so important to choose kindness in every aspect of life.” Music starts to play over the speakers, the signal to wrap up his speech. Harry takes the cue and rushes through the end of his speech.

“So I urge each and every one of you to treat people with kindness tomorrow, and every day. Lastly, thank you Mum, for your endless support. And thank you, Louis, for being my other half, my guiding light, my soul mate.”

Thunderous applause carries him off the stage. A bright flash of admiration is sent from Louis as he is guided through a curtain to backstage by a frazzled woman with a clipboard and headset. He’s ushered into a small broom closet sized room. It is decorated with too much gold and scented with a potent cloud of expensive perfumes of all the people that have been in the room. 

He is passed off to another assistant, for a quick fire round of interviews with all of the top entertainment news outlets. He poses for photos with his award before he hands it off to be engraved Then, he is handed off to yet another assistant who directs him back to the audience.

He quickly makes his way back to his vacant seat, just before the next presenters make their way out. There are only two awards left. Best Director, which _Redemption in Rome_ was not nominated, and Best Picture which it was nominated. 

Harry is so proud of _Redemption in Rome_, of the producers and director, and of the cast and crew. They’ve all worked so tirelessly on this project and put their hearts into the film. A Best Picture win would be incredible for all of them. However, the Best Picture category is tight this year. There are ten incredible films all with varying stories, casts, and genres. _Redemption in Rome_ is a longshot to win.

Louis squeezes Harry’s hand tighter than he has all night as they begin to introduce each of the nominated films. Harry shifts in his seat and runs his free hand through his hair anxiously. The intense nerves that had let up after his win have returned with force. Louis is just as nervous, after all it is his first Oscar nomination. 

Harry holds his breath and listens carefully this time as the presenters open the envelope and call out the winner. Another movie is awarded the Oscar and an unfamiliar cast and crew flood the stage. Harry stands and applauds with the rest of the audience. He joins in the celebration, a spectator to what could have been as the winning cast embraces each other. He is not surprised that another film won. But there is still a brief sense of ‘what if’ behind his smile and he feels a thin fog of disappointment drift over from Louis. 

Overall, it is still a very successful night. Three wins out of the five total nominations is nothing to be sad about. Harry can’t wipe the smile from his face. When the show wraps up and the theater is released from the tight constraints of being filmed live and the house lights are turned up, Harry stands and stretches. 

Louis gives him a small kiss and a long hug, and whispers “I’m so proud of you.”

\- - -

It is very late. Or technically, very early. After making the obligatory rounds at the industry-held afterparties, Harry was released to find his own celebration. Zayn had invited Harry and Louis to his rooftop party after congratulating him on his win. He’d texted Harry his address and ensured him that he would be more than welcome to drop in at any time.

A full moon hangs above the rooftop after-afterparty. The crowded dance floor pulses to the beats spun by the DJ. Bars lined with color-changing lights are manned by skilled bartenders that toss bottles in the air as they mix colorful drinks. A group of people are gathered in the kitchen taking body shots off the bare chested man draped across the counter. 

Despite the party raging around them, Harry and Louis are off in their own world. They’ve found a quiet corner of the rooftop, tucked behind some huge potted trees and away from the dancefloor. Harry leans against the railing, the metal cool beneath his touch. Louis stands beside him, leaning into his side for warmth. They stare out over the city, backs turned away from the party. 

They are both sobering up as the party rages on behind them. They’d done their share of celebratory champagne and shots at earlier parties. But Louis whispering filthy promises of a reward for his Oscar-winning boy when they got home had been encouragement enough for them to skip the bar at this last party. 

Harry turns toward Louis, thinking about the fantasies he’d described during their car ride to Zayn’s. Heat pools in his belly at the images that come to mind, of wandering hands, wet lips, and the press of fingers. 

The silver moonlight highlights the contour of Louis’ nose, the sharpness of his cheekbone, and the cut of his jaw. He is irresistible. Harry leans down and kisses his favorite spot, on his neck just below his ear. He holds him with large palms on the dip of his waist. He deepens the kiss against Louis’ skin, licking his tongue against the soft skin. He latches on, sucking and biting at the spot, making sure that he will leave a mark. 

Louis’ hand makes its way to Harry’s hair, combing gently through the tousled waves that have long since lost their carefully styled appearance. His hand comes to cradle Harry’s head, pressing him closer into the curve of his neck. Harry nips sharply at the tender skin in response, drawing a loud moan from Louis. 

Harry releases his mouth from the bruised flesh, seeking Louis’ lips. Louis meets him halfway, pulling him in closer. There is not a millimeter between their bodies when Harry has crowded into the curves of Louis’ body. Harry’s hands drift to the top of Louis’ bum. The kiss deepens. Harry is growing hard, can feel his cock twitch when Louis licks into his mouth just right. Louis expertly draws a soft mewl from Harry as he bites at his swollen lower lip. Louis shifts his attention from Harry’s lips to his collarbone, pulling back the collar of his shirt to bare the unmarked skin. 

Harry catches a bit of movement out of the corner of his eye. He looks over just as a woman stumbles around one of the potted trees. 

“Oh, sorry.” The woman says. Louis doesn’t seem bothered, continuing to lave his tongue over the damp bruising skin. Harry turns his head to glance up at the person that has intruded on their quiet corner. He vaguely recognizes her as someone famous, but can’t put a name to the face. 

When neither Louis or Harry say anything, the woman continues, “I was just looking for a quiet place to have a smoke.” She waves a box of cigarettes in one of her hands.

“Don’t mind us, love.” Louis says, breaking away from Harry’s skin just long enough to pull them closer to the corner of the railing to make space for the woman.

“Alright.” The woman takes out a cigarette and leans against the rail. She faces out toward the city, not paying any mind to them.

Louis returns to kissing Harry as if nothing has happened. As if there isn’t a stranger standing just three feet to their left. Louis deepens the kiss, tongue licking past Harry’s swollen lips. Heat rises to Harry’s cheeks. He’s embarrassed at having someone close enough to watch, close enough to hear. He is also very turned on by that notion and that makes him all the more embarrassed. It is a positive feedback that clouds his mind with lust and fills his cock. 

Harry’s proclivity for exhibitionism is nothing new, but not something they’ve explored extensively. It seems that Louis is seizing the opportunity that has presented itself to delve a little further into Harry’s exhibitionist streak. Harry can sense the perceptive focus that Louis brings to the front of his mind, a familiar feeling whenever they begin a scene. Harry feels cared for with Louis’ full attention tuned to his needs. He allows himself to sink into the intense desire spreading between them, trusting Louis .

Louis shifts his weight and pops his hip. The new position brings his thigh close enough to Harry that he could grind down for some relief, if he is brave enough to do so in front of their audience. 

The thought of getting off so blatantly in front of a stranger brings him closer to subspace. A light fog drifts into the edges of his vision. But, Louis did not give him permission and he knows the rules. Harry restrains himself from grinding down. Instead he focuses on kissing Louis deeper, hotter. Louis’ mouth distracts him from thoughts of the stranger. 

Eventually the woman leaves and Harry gets lost once again in their solitary corner. 

When Harry realises that the woman is no longer leaning against the railing, he experimentally grinds onto Louis’ thigh. His breath catches at the electricity that flows up his spine. When no reprimand comes for being greedy, he seeks out the friction with more certainty, leaning into Louis as he rocks his hips forward. His cock is surely flushed and leaking where it is trapped in the confines of his pants. But they can’t do much about that out on the rooftop, with other partiers merely ten feet away. Harry moans at the thought of one of the partiers catching him as he chases his orgasm. 

Louis pulls back before Harry can get himself too worked up. “Save it for later, love.” Louis whispers in his ear. Louis captures his mouth before he can protest. He rucks up Harry’s shirt, getting his hands on his heated skin underneath. His deft fingers trace the laurels from memory. A shiver runs up Harry’s spine as his fingers ghost lightly over the trail of pubes above his waistband. He gets lost in the press of fingers on his waist and the slide of lips against his own.

Hours or minutes pass before they are once again interrupted.

“Ahem.” A throat clears to their left.

They reluctantly pull apart and find Zayn standing next to one of the huge potted trees, arms crossed over his chest and hip popped slightly. He gives them a knowing look, a smirk. Harry self consciously adjusts his shirt, pulling down the hem where it had tucked up to expose one of his laurels. 

“Sorry to interrupt.” Zayn says. “It’s just that the other three nominees are all here and one of them wants another pic for their Instagram, if you’re up for it.” 

Harry blinks to clear the fog of desire to focus on Zayn’s question. It takes him a moment to process the idea and think of a response. They’d already had formal pictures taken, the official Academy arranging photos during one of the pre-Oscar events to document each category. But Instagram isn’t for carefully staged group photos. A candid party shot with the four other well-respected actors sounds like a great way to memorialize this unbelievable night. So Harry agrees. 

“Oh yeah, that’d be great.” 

“Cool. I’ll give you two a second to get sorted. We’ll be in the kitchen.” Zayn walks away before either can respond. 

At his comment, Harry takes stock of their appearance. Louis is not too disheveled. His tie is only loosened and his hair a bit tousled. Harry, however, is looking worse for wear, ravaged by Louis’ constant need to have his hands on his boy. Harry’s shirt is untucked and mostly unbuttoned, falling off one shoulder to expose half of the moth and one of the sparrow tattoos. His tie is hanging loose around his neck. 

“Here, let me.” Louis reaches out a careful hand to comb through Harry’s hair with deft fingers. He straightens his shirt collar to sit squarely on his shoulders and does up a few more buttons. Then he pulls on the end of the loose tie around Harry’s neck. The cool silk fabric rubs against the nape of his neck. Harry shudders. Louis folds the tie neatly and tucks it into his front pants pocket. There’s not much else they can do to disguise their rumpled clothes and ruddy cheeks, or the hard-on Harry is sporting. But it’s better than nothing.

They head into the thick of the party, Harry led by the steady hand pressed to the small of his back under his untucked shirt. They weave through the throng of bodies pulsing on the dancefloor and passed the crush of people surrounding the bar. They walk through an open doorway into a large kitchen, loud with overlapping conversations and the bass of the music spilling in from the rooftop. It is easy to find Zayn, the center of a group at the edge of the kitchen. 

Harry sees the other three Best Actor nominees standing around him, all with drinks in their hands. They sidle up to the group. 

When one of them whistles lowly and makes a joke about their obvious activities, Louis laugh it off. “I can’t help it. Gotta blame it on the endorphins of the night. I’m just so proud of my boy.” Louis plants a chaste kiss to Harry’s temple. Harry flushes, basking in the compliments from Louis and the display of affection in front of acquaintances. 

They take half a dozen pictures before the group dissipates back into the crowd, Louis and Harry are once again alone. They wander back onto the moonlit rooftop, walking aimlessly around conversations. Away from people once again, it is easy to fall back into their solitary bubble. Harry leans heavily into Louis with his head tucked into Louis neck, breathing in the remnants of his cologne and closing his eyes for a moment of peace. The adrenaline of winning an Oscar has faded into a content hum and the arousal from their interrupted kiss still thrums under his skin. Through it all he can sense a ribbon of pride and desire twirling from Louis. It’s a strange cocktail of pleasant emotions that he wants to soak up, to sink into it. 

“Can we sit?” Harry murmurs lowly to Louis, gesturing to a bench that another couple has just vacated.

Louis hums, thinking it over for a second, then answers, “I think we’ve been here long enough. Let’s get you home.” Louis presses a chaste kiss to his temple before pulling away, forcing Harry to stand on his own. He wraps his arm around Harry’s waist and leads him away from the party.

\- - -

The door slams shut behind Harry and Louis as they enter their house. They stumble down the hall to their bedroom, stripping off their clothes as they go. Their shoes left by the door, Louis’ coat dropped over here, Harry’s shirt tossed there. They can’t keep their hands off each other for long.

Louis pushes Harry against the wall and kisses him hard. His body holds Harry in place as his tongue and lips explore. Harry weaves his fingers through the short hairs at the nape of Louis’ neck, pulling him deeper into the kiss. With eager hands Louis rids Harry of his remaining clothes, save his pants. His erection strains against the thin fabric. 

Harry drops his hands from Louis’ hair, attempting to get him out of his suit as well. He manages to get Louis' pants unbuttoned and pushed around his knees before Louis guides him onto his knees. The soft padding of the grey rug in their bedroom cushions his knees. He looks up through his eyelashes at Louis standing tall before him, still wearing nearly all of his clothes. He feels exposed, left only in his pants at Louis’ feet. He shivers in anticipation.

“Can I?” Harry asks cautiously, trying to feel out Louis’ plan. Will he let Harry take what he wants tonight, or is Harry supposed to accept whatever reward Louis offers? Over the months they’ve been exploring this kinkier side of their sex life, Harry has been learning to read Louis’ moods, to figure out how to please him best.

“Yes, go ahead, love.” Louis says, placing a warm palm against Harry’s cheek. He leans into the touch and closes his eyes, trying to steady his racing heartbeat. It seems Louis is in a rare generous mood tonight, and Harry gets more excited thinking about possible rewards Louis might be planning for him.

After a moment of collecting himself, Harry pulls Louis’ length free from his pants. Harry wraps his hand around his hard length. Louis hisses at the touch of cold metal of Harry’s rings to his heated skin. Harry gives Louis a few slow strokes before he kisses the tip. He pulls away and licks at the bit of wetness left on his bottom lip. 

“No teasing.” Louis warns. His hand grips at Harry’s hair and drags him in. Harry takes Louis’ length into his mouth, adjusting to the familiar stretch in his jaw. His tongue traces up the underside of his length while his hand twists at the base of his cock. He breathes through his nose as he presses deeper, Louis pressing against the back of his throat. Louis moans and his fingers tighten in Harry’s curls, tugging sharply at the strands in his fingers. Harry hums, the vibrations causing Louis to thrust forward. Harry sputters at the unexpected intrusion, but recovers quickly. A soft tap to Louis’ hip encourages him to continue. Louis picks up on the signal, thrusting deeper until Harry is taking his whole length. Harry relaxes, subspace creeping at the edges of his mind. He can feel the desire building in Louis in the tensing of his muscles, the stutter of his hips. Then suddenly, Louis pulls out.

When Harry whines at the loss of the weight on his tongue, Louis bends down to quiet him with a press of his lips. “Not yet. It’s your night, baby. You come first.” Louis winks. “Let’s get you up on the bed.”

Harry takes off his pants and moves to the bed. As he is spreading himself out on his back, displaying himself for Louis, Louis takes off his own shirt. Harry stares at his bared chest, admiring his fit body. Louis joins him on the bed, crawling over to settle between Harry’s spread thighs. Harry watches, enraptured, as Louis pulls Harry’s discarded tie from the pocket of his suit pants. Harry’s breath stutters and his eyes flutter closed. His cock twitches against his stomach as he tries to figure out if he is getting tied up or blindfolded with his own tie. He can’t decide which is better. Luckily, Louis decides for him.

“Hands above your head.” 

Harry whines under his breath as he follows the order. He holds his hands over his head and waits eagerly for the feeling of the restraint tightening around his wrists. 

Affection flowing through their soul bond as Louis stares, admiring the way Harry is spread out, vulnerable in front of him. Harry counts his breaths to stay present until Louis moves. Finally, Louis leans over Harry’s body, dragging the tip of the silky tie lightly up and down his arms. Then he pulls back. 

“What are our safe words?” Louis asks. 

Harry is quick to list their stoplight system. Louis gives him a small kiss as a reward. When Louis holds up the tie in Harry’s line of sight once more, he assures Louis that his color is green. 

Louis is quick with his knots, restraining Harry’s wrists in the silky fabric. The tie isn’t the strongest of restraints, but that doesn’t matter. It is the trust he places in Louis, knowing that he will give Harry everything he needs. He tugs at them anyway, feeling the restriction as the fabric tightens with the force. 

Satisfied with the knots, Louis hovers over Harry. He drops his head, catching Harry in a kiss, moaning into the heat of his mouth. Harry is restless and cants his hips up, searching for needed friction. His bared cock brushing against Louis’ stomach earns a swat on the hip from Louis, but no real punishment. It’s clear that Louis is focused on rewarding him tonight. 

Louis grabs the lube from the drawer and coats his fingers. The cool liquid causes Harry to hiss as Louis fingers him open. He arches his back into the motion of Louis’ thrusts, chasing the feeling of fullness. Louis adds a second finger, the stretch on the right side of painful. Louis presses in slowly to the second knuckle, until cool, hard metal catches against his rim. Harry whines and clenches tightly as he realizes that he is feeling Louis’ engagement ring. Harry thrusts his hips trying to pull his fingers in deeper, chasing the feeling. He grows tired without the use of his arms and he whines high in his throat. 

“Lou, please!”

Louis pulls out his fingers and wipes the excess lube on the sheet. He discards the rest of his clothes and wastes no time getting back between Harry’s thighs. He lifts Harry’s legs by the knees and lines up, pressing his cock in steadily. The sudden stretch burns, but Harry settles into it, taking all Louis will give. 

Harry takes a moment to adjust, eyes closed, absorbing the intensity of their connection. He feels pride and love swelling around them, a chorus of their emotions exchanged between their bond. Louis presses soft close mouthed kisses to Harry’s lips.

“I’m good.” Harry says, when it no longer feels like too much. “Please.”

Finally, Louis rocks into him, slow and deep and intense. Harry’s stomach clenches at the pleasure coursing through his veins. Louis’ hips thrust steadily, drawing deep moans from Harry. Harry’s neglected cock leaks against his stomach, precome smearing up over the moth tattoo. 

Harry uses his feet on the mattress for leverage as he grinds into Louis’ thrusts. The different angle causes Louis’ cock to hit Harry’s spot, dragging over his sensitive prostate.  
Harry wrists pull at the tie, the restraint holding him captive.

Their kisses turn sloppy until they can’t kiss anymore. panting between each other as they move together. Louis thrusts in deep and grinds his hips against Harry’s. He stays deep, circling and shallowly thrusting. With one hand, he reaches between them to pull Harry off. His hand twists tightly around the crown of Harry’s cock twice and he grind in deeply. Harry clenches down on Louis’ length and he comes, spilling in hot, white ribbons between them. 

Louis pulls out crowding in close. He strips his own cock with purpose, bringing himself over the edge with a rush of all encompassing love flooding through their soul bond. He spills over Harry’s stomach, their come mixing with Harry’s.

They both come down from their highs, breaths settling and heart rates steadying. Louis unties Harry, cleans them both up, then crawls back into bed. He wraps himself around Harry and whispers good night. 

It should be easy to fall asleep. He is exhausted and Louis certainly didn’t struggle to fall asleep. He’s already snoring softly where he’s tucked against Harry’s back, arms wrapped around Harry. Harry stares at their aligned tattoos. He can barely make out the contrasting ink from their skin, but knows their positions by heart. He can’t believe how lucky he is. He thinks for a while about all the things that have happened and all the exciting things yet to come, like their actual legal marriage to go with their soul bond, the time off from acting, the album deal he got, and just being in Louis’s arms. He’s too excited about everything and can’t fall asleep so he types out another tweet. Hands on the wheel.

The Willie Nelson song has been on repeat for the past few weeks.

He has been in the studio a lot over the past month, penning songs, jamming with whoever was available, and recording vocals. He has finished a few songs, but needs a slower, soulful ballad to round out the album. So, his producer put together a playlist in an attempt to hone in on the sound that he is aiming to capture. Out of a dozen songs, “Hands on the Wheel” instantly stuck out to him. 

Harry connected with the lyrics, seeing his feelings toward Louis reflected in them. Louis came into his life when he’d been simply going through the motions and following orders. He was burnt out from the stress of his high-profile career. Louis showed him how to take the wheel again, to take back control of his career. Louis brought meaning to his life that he’s never had before.

_Now my hand's on the wheel_  
_I've something that's real_  
_And I feel like I'm going home_

He hopes to capture the same honesty, the same earnestness in a song of his own. He hopes that tweeting these lyrics will be a reflection of all the good that is to come, know that he is finally taking control of his career and has Louis by his side.

He looks over the tweet one last time, watching the likes and retweets jump rapidly. He locks his phone and sets it soundlessly on the nightstand before he turns over, curling into Louis’ side. He falls asleep easily, knowing that he is ready to face whatever the Fates throw at him next, as long as he has the moon and his soulmate by his side.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed it. [Here](https://haztobegood.tumblr.com/post/187941249468/take-on-me-by-haztobegood-rating-e-word-count) is a rebloggable post for the fic.


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